Stirling professor wants lecturers to be more funny

A Stirling University professor has said that lecturers should learn stand-up comedy to skills to make lectures more interesting.

Cate Watson, a professor in professional education has advised that lecturers would be able to deliver social insights and raise awareness of research by adopting similar methods of our favourite comedians.

Watson told The Times, “Good stand-up comedians are capable of achieving what social scientists crave- getting an audience to critically engage with a subject. However humorous academics appear to run the risk of not being taken seriously.”

Recent research carried out in America has found that students are more likely to remember details from lectures when they are made humorous.

The claim made by Watson is also backed up by Stephen Darling, a psychology lecturer at Queen Margaret University who performs as a stand-up who says: “In comedy you have to get your message across and hold people’s attention. It has really helped me in my day job.”

It seems that there may be more similarities between stand-up comedy and lectures and if they were lightened up then we could become more engaged, as it is more interesting to hear someone make a joke about their mother-in-law than explain the intricacies of integrating Germany into the European Union.