A Case for Humor: How Girls’ Silliness is Bridging the Confidence Gap

As I worked as a camp counselor this summer, I was ready for all of the surprises– from pulling ticks out from between my kid's toes to telling them to stop starting fires, my days were filled with spontaneity and almost nothing phased me. What truly caught me off-guard, however, were the girls in my camp, as they were the funniest group of kids I’ve ever met. 

From telling hilarious stories to rating their burps, my days were full of nonstop laughter. While this may seem like nothing out of the ordinary– kids like to make jokes and be funny– these 13, 14, and 15-year-old girls were a part of the age group that overwhelmingly experiences all-time lows in their levels of confidence. At their age, I was an insecure mess who definitely was not going to do anything out of the ordinary, let alone in front of strangers. The mere fact that they were speaking their minds was breaking societal expectations for their levels of confidence. And while I’m sure that their bravery was in part due to the safe and excluded camp setting, it made me realize how important humor is in building confidence in young girls. 

The Confidence Gap 

The lack of self-assuredness that young girls commonly face is a symptom of the confidence gap.  From childhood, these “zones of female self-doubt” follow girls into adulthood and take the forms of imposter syndrome, unsureness in decision-making, and especially a lack of risk-taking. We see this almost everywhere in our lives today- through expectations of lower test scores in schools, assumptions that others are more knowledgeable in conversations, and internal attributions of failure, men are undoubtedly outperforming women in the confidence game.  

This is especially prominent in the workforce, as women face disparities in the attainment of higher positions. Not only do they initiate raises 5% less than men do, but are 8% less likely to actually receive what they ask for and apply for new positions at a rate 20% less despite similar job searches. As a result, women have not gained the same mobility as men have in the workforce. Despite making up more than half of the population, a study done by Pew Research Center shows that as of 2023, women make up less than 30% of both houses of Congress, state legislatures, fortune 500 board members, college presidents, and a record high of 10.6% of CEOS.  

Causes of the Confidence Gap 

While federal laws such as the Equal Pay Act and Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act protect women from discrimination in the workforce, we still see these disparities. After all, it would be both meaningless and impossible to enact legislation mandating that women just be more confident. However, the legacies of past institutional barriers that women faced toward equal rights play a role in the attitudes of women today. While white women gained the right to vote in 1920, it would take until the civil rights movement in the 1960s for all women to gain this right. Even after we still saw discrimination through unfair voting laws. Additionally, women were not allowed to divorce through mutual consent until 1969, to have their own credit cards until 1974, or even to get business loans without a male cosigner in all states until 1988. Even as we’ve made immeasurable strides in the women's rights movement, just two generations ago the prospects for women were extremely different. Throughout history, women grew up in a world that did not entrust them with the authority to control their own lives. It’s no wonder these attitudes made their way into their minds and kept them from building confidence. And we still see this today as women face barriers like the pink tax, unequal pay, and the recent erosion of abortion rights. 

As this history of sexism affects our values and mindsets, it also influences how we raise our children. Though this is slowly changing, boys and girls widely receive different treatments in schools and from their parents. As girls are generally rewarded for doing things quietly, neatly, and happily, they learn to associate good behavior with approval from authority figures. As a result, they take fewer risks and get punished less, which means that girls miss out on learning how to handle rejection. This also translates into perfectionism, which is undoubtedly connected to confidence as girls feel they cannot make mistakes to be fully qualified for a task. Boys, on the other hand, grow up in a more flexible environment. Oftentimes they’re treated with more tolerance when it comes to roughhousing and joking as it’s written off as “boy behavior.” But it’s this “boy behavior” that actually helps in confidence building. Joking and roughhousing are major ways that children build resilience- it exposes them to insults and evaluations in a non-serious manner, ultimately taking away power from the degrading aspects of these situations. This is not to say that bullying has this effect, however, growing up in an environment where one is able to not internalize evaluations is vital for dealing with rejection and constructive criticism later in life. Resilience also plays into competition, as boys are encouraged more to participate in sports. As humor helps to build foundations of confidence, competition in sports is a way to enhance and solidify those skills. However, when girls lack confidence, they are more likely to give up and stop competing. Because they stop competing, they miss out on even more confidence-building potential. Once created, this lack of confidence in girls is unfortunately a self-perpetuating problem. 

How humor translates to confidence: Investing in silliness is investing in leadership 

Beyond creating foundations in resilience, skills in humor dismantle other women's issues. In this case, tackling perfectionism, people-pleasing, and low self-esteem. Whether it’s making a joke or pointing out an obvious coincidence, when one uses humor they take control of the conversation by setting its emotional tone. As girls do not speak up as much and cater their actions towards the wellbeing of others, being able to laugh is to not take the situation so seriously. It displays confidence through being comfortable in your own skin and with the people around you, leaving girls to feel good about themselves after conversations instead of overthinking the things they say. Practicing humor is essentially practicing self-assuredness. We can especially see this in a recent study done by De Gruyer, examining the relationship between humor styles, body image, and eating disorders. This study found that women who had self-enhancing humor faced higher levels of body appreciation, compassion, and kindness than those with self-deprecating humor. Humor endorsers also experienced lower levels of emotional eating than humor deniers. Using humor as a tool, we can see how important it is to our image of ourselves and the world around us. If girls are able to establish these patterns before they grow up, they can prevent so many of the problems that are likely to find them later in life. 

Along with confidence, humor-or a supposed lack-of humor, is largely a women's issue. For centuries women have been deprived of the label of funny through the common tropes of prostitute and matron, and patriarchal ideas about women's roles. We have even seen this in academia. Take someone as influential as Sigmund Freud, who concluded that women's humor is biologically impossible as their worldviews are based upon rationalizing their inferiority to men. While this is widely considered an outrageous take to readers today, Freud's views were shaped by the culture of his time and continued to influence further research. Even into the 21st century, as we can see from the influential 2007 article “Why Women Aren’t  Funny,” arguing that it goes against females’ reproductive interests. 

But anyone can see that the notion of the “unfunny woman” is simply untrue. As of today, the amount of prominent female comedians is unprecedented, and just like male comedians, they have their own social media presence, shows, and fans. For non-comedians, women on social media go viral all the time for their witty tweets and videos. Even in our personal lives, I’m sure we all know at least a couple of funny women. And it’s not to say that women are only funny now. In fact, the narrative that women are unfunny is relatively new, as it arose in the 19th century when humor became commodified from the rise of comedy shows- which of course, were dominated by men. We only see so much of it now because they finally have the platforms to make their voices heard. By being funny, women are showing the world that they deserve to be respected. 

So how can we encourage this in young girls? We can start by promoting equal treatment and safe spaces. As patriarchal norms are ingrained in our society, almost every aspect of our lives has the potential for improvement. This means efforts on personal levels from parents and teachers, but also on institutional levels from schools and the media. Dismantling the gender roles that our society is built upon targets the problem at its source, preventing it from affecting our new generations. Funny Girls, a program by the Harnisch Foundation, does just that. Through improv classes in under-resourced communities, Funny Girls sets out to build 5 leadership skills in young girls: self-awareness, resiliency, empathy, agility, and collaboration. This program believes that improv classes force people to unlock their silly sides, ultimately providing a safe environment for girls to take leadership over their own stories and build confidence. And this is only one organization- I believe that more programs like this could be truly revolutionary for generations to come. 

While there are exponentially more women in positions of power than there were 50 years ago, it’s not enough. This problem will not be solved until we see women in leadership roles at the same rates as men. And though humor is not the only solution, its great importance cannot be overlooked. With my girl campers this summer, their goofy sides turned out to be their hidden superpowers. As their jokes and silliness worked towards breaking a cycle that has kept women down for so long, perhaps this is the perfect example of the empowerment of humor.