References
An introduction to black humour as a coping mechanism for student paramedics
Abstract
Black or gallows humour has long been recognised as having therapeutic value, particularly when used by individuals dealing with traumatic incidents. With this in mind, it is no surprise that this type of humour is commonly used by emergency services personnel. It is a bona fide coping mechanism which can contribute to the resilience, health and wellbeing of emergency services personnel but one which, to the uninitiated, may appear callous and uncaring. With student paramedics now taking the higher educational route into paramedicine, they will have had less exposure to ambulance service culture before qualifying than would have been the case with the old ‘in service’ pathway. This often results in the type of humour employed by their new colleagues coming as something of a culture shock. This article hopes to go some way to explain why this type of humour is employed, what purposes it serves, and prepare students so that it may appear less shocking when they first encounter it.
Humour is an integral part of human relationships and plays numerous and significant roles in both personal and social lives (Ertel, 2002). Theories on humour abound and come from a wide variety of perspectives such as psychological, sociological, anthropological, linguistic and theatrical (Haig, 1986). It is accepted that humour can act as a form of tension release (Koestler, 1964; Martin and Lefcourt, 1983) and that it can be used as a valuable coping strategy for those who have to encounter unpleasant or traumatic events in the course of their everyday lives (Moran and Massam, 1997; van Wormer and Boes, 1997; Schwab, 2002). Medical and emergency services personnel are particularly likely to use humour to counteract the effects of dealing with stressful situations and this contributes to a person's resilience when dealing with stressful situations (Grafton et al, 2010; Griner, 2013). Van Wormer and Boes (1997) studied humour as a coping mechanism as used by staff working in an accident and emergency (A&E) department and found that they typically used five varieties:
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