Women bossesare less likely to cut jokes in the boardroom as they are met with an awkward silence in 80% of their attempts to raise few laughs, a new study has found. The study carried out by linguistics expert Judith Baxter from Aston university found that more 80% of quips made by senior female were met with silence with 70% portraying themselves in a modestly negative light.It also found that women bosses are more likely to use self deprecation as humor with their attempts at cracking jokes but they are often viewed as contrived defensive just mean the daily Telegraph reported however in comparison 90% of jokes made by man were found to achieve a positive response with a immediate outburst of laughter or approval as a result men are found to be more than three times more likely to make jokes while leading a meeting than their female counterparts.

For the study Dr. Baxter spent 18 months study-ing the speech pattern of employees at seven large companies including two in the FTSE100. of the 600,0000 words used across 14 meetings half of which were led by women and half by men she found women used a distinct type of humor differently to men.

She said one type of humor women leaders do use more than men is self-deprecating humor women would rather laugh at themselves on the whole than laugh at other because it is the safe option when they do their humor can appears arch contrived defencive or occasionally just mean my research has shown that male mangers use humor to demonstrate and display their relationship their leadership of a team their male subordinates will also use display humor to impress a male boss because it show they are on the same wavelength said Dr Baxter.