The present study demonstrates that implicit egotism is relevant to not only letter attractiveness ratings on the Name Letter Test (NLT), but also to judgments of humor--albeit to a lesser degree. Respondents participated as \"mock\" judges in a simulated cartoon caption contest and evaluated writers' caption submissions for two cartoons. It was hypothesized that participants would exhibit biases toward captions submitted by writers with whom they shared a first initial letter, and additionally, their gender. A name letter effect was found in participants' judgments of humor and on the NLT. Shared gender with a caption writer--when coupled with a shared initial--increased biases toward these writers' captions, but not significantly so. The impact of implicit self-esteem on initial-letter biases was examined, with level of implicit self-esteem weakly predicting NLT biases, but not biases demonstrated toward captions submitted by same-initial writers. While name-letter preferences are believed to tap implicit self-esteem, less than one-third of participants demonstrated high implicit self-esteem, despite the very large name letter effect observed on the NLT. This challenges the notion that people overwhelmingly possess the positive self-attitudes thought to ignite implicit egotism. Recent researchers have suggested that the NLT is best understood as a measure for which it was first designed--implicit egotism, the tendency to display automatic self-positivity biases toward targets that share our self-attributes--instead of a measure of implicit self-esteem. This possibility is discussed and explored with analyses of the relationships between the NLT, explicit self-esteem, and implicit self-esteem.
","abstract_html":"<p>The present study demonstrates that implicit egotism is relevant to not only letter attractiveness ratings on the Name Letter Test (NLT), but also to judgments of humor--albeit to a lesser degree. Respondents participated as "mock" judges in a simulated cartoon caption contest and evaluated writers' caption submissions for two cartoons. It was hypothesized that participants would exhibit biases toward captions submitted by writers with whom they shared a first initial letter, and additionally, their gender. A name letter effect was found in participants' judgments of humor and on the NLT. Shared gender with a caption writer--when coupled with a shared initial--increased biases toward these writers' captions, but not significantly so. The impact of implicit self-esteem on initial-letter biases was examined, with level of implicit self-esteem weakly predicting NLT biases, but not biases demonstrated toward captions submitted by same-initial writers. While name-letter preferences are believed to tap implicit self-esteem, less than one-third of participants demonstrated high implicit self-esteem, despite the very large name letter effect observed on the NLT. This challenges the notion that people overwhelmingly possess the positive self-attitudes thought to ignite implicit egotism. Recent researchers have suggested that the NLT is best understood as a measure for which it was first designed--implicit egotism, the tendency to display automatic self-positivity biases toward targets that share our self-attributes--instead of a measure of implicit self-esteem. This possibility is discussed and explored with analyses of the relationships between the NLT, explicit self-esteem, and implicit self-esteem.</p>","abstract_has_math":false,"creators":["Ryan, Jenna"],"institution":null,"degree_name":"Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)","degree_level":"Dissertation","degree_discipline":"School of Education","degree_department":null,"school":null,"contributors":[],"advisors":[],"committee_chairs":[],"committee_members":[],"year":2012,"date_issued":"2012-01-01T08:00:00Z","date_published":"2012-01-01T08:00:00Z","updated_at":"2026-07-24T02:55:31Z","subjects":["humor","implicit egotism","the name letter effect","Social Psychology"],"languages":[],"rights":[],"rights_urls":[],"identifier_entries":[]},"links":{"outbound_url":"https://ecommons.luc.edu/luc_diss/389","outbound_label":"Repository record","outbound_source":"dc:identifier"},"metadata_groups":[{"id":"people","label":"People","entries":[{"key":"dc:creator","label":"Author","values":["Ryan, Jenna"]}]},{"id":"academic_context","label":"Academic Context","entries":[{"key":"dc:date.available","label":"Dc Date Available","values":["2016-03-31T17:11:03Z"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_discipline","label":"Discipline","values":["School of Education"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_level","label":"Degree Level","values":["Dissertation"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_name","label":"Degree Name","values":["Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)"]}]},{"id":"subjects_keywords","label":"Subjects and Keywords","entries":[{"key":"dc:subject","label":"Dc Subject","values":["humor","implicit egotism","the name letter effect","Social Psychology"]}]},{"id":"identifiers","label":"Identifiers","entries":[{"key":"dc:identifier","label":"Identifier","values":["https://ecommons.luc.edu/luc_diss/389"]}]},{"id":"additional","label":"Additional Metadata","entries":[{"key":"dc:description.abstract","label":"Abstract","values":["The present study demonstrates that implicit egotism is relevant to not only letter attractiveness ratings on the Name Letter Test (NLT), but also to judgments of humor--albeit to a lesser degree. Respondents participated as \"mock\" judges in a simulated cartoon caption contest and evaluated writers' caption submissions for two cartoons. It was hypothesized that participants would exhibit biases toward captions submitted by writers with whom they shared a first initial letter, and additionally, their gender. A name letter effect was found in participants' judgments of humor and on the NLT. Shared gender with a caption writer--when coupled with a shared initial--increased biases toward these writers' captions, but not significantly so. The impact of implicit self-esteem on initial-letter biases was examined, with level of implicit self-esteem weakly predicting NLT biases, but not biases demonstrated toward captions submitted by same-initial writers. While name-letter preferences are believed to tap implicit self-esteem, less than one-third of participants demonstrated high implicit self-esteem, despite the very large name letter effect observed on the NLT. This challenges the notion that people overwhelmingly possess the positive self-attitudes thought to ignite implicit egotism. Recent researchers have suggested that the NLT is best understood as a measure for which it was first designed--implicit egotism, the tendency to display automatic self-positivity biases toward targets that share our self-attributes--instead of a measure of implicit self-esteem. This possibility is discussed and explored with analyses of the relationships between the NLT, explicit self-esteem, and implicit self-esteem.
"]},{"key":"dc:title","label":"Title","values":["You Had Me at Helen: The Name Letter Effect in Judgments of Humor"]}]}],"canonical_facts":{"dc:creator":["Ryan, Jenna"],"dc:date.available":["2016-03-31T17:11:03Z"],"dc:description.abstract":["The present study demonstrates that implicit egotism is relevant to not only letter attractiveness ratings on the Name Letter Test (NLT), but also to judgments of humor--albeit to a lesser degree. Respondents participated as \"mock\" judges in a simulated cartoon caption contest and evaluated writers' caption submissions for two cartoons. It was hypothesized that participants would exhibit biases toward captions submitted by writers with whom they shared a first initial letter, and additionally, their gender. A name letter effect was found in participants' judgments of humor and on the NLT. Shared gender with a caption writer--when coupled with a shared initial--increased biases toward these writers' captions, but not significantly so. The impact of implicit self-esteem on initial-letter biases was examined, with level of implicit self-esteem weakly predicting NLT biases, but not biases demonstrated toward captions submitted by same-initial writers. While name-letter preferences are believed to tap implicit self-esteem, less than one-third of participants demonstrated high implicit self-esteem, despite the very large name letter effect observed on the NLT. This challenges the notion that people overwhelmingly possess the positive self-attitudes thought to ignite implicit egotism. Recent researchers have suggested that the NLT is best understood as a measure for which it was first designed--implicit egotism, the tendency to display automatic self-positivity biases toward targets that share our self-attributes--instead of a measure of implicit self-esteem. This possibility is discussed and explored with analyses of the relationships between the NLT, explicit self-esteem, and implicit self-esteem.
"],"dc:identifier":["https://ecommons.luc.edu/luc_diss/389"],"dc:subject":["humor","implicit egotism","the name letter effect","Social Psychology"],"dc:title":["You Had Me at Helen: The Name Letter Effect in Judgments of Humor"],"thesis:degree_discipline":["School of Education"],"thesis:degree_level":["Dissertation"],"thesis:degree_name":["Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)"]},"updated_at":"2026-07-24T02:55:31Z"}