Interestingly, there is abundant cross-cultural evidence that shows that being funny makes you more desirable as a mate.

"For dating couples, use of positive humor (for example, using humor to cheer up your date) can positively contribute to relationship satisfaction. The use of aggressive humor, on the other hand (teasing and making fun of your partner) has the opposite effect. These feelings can fluctuate on a day-to-day basis depending on each partner's use of humor," evolutionary psychologist Gil Greengross wrote in The Conversation.

For long-term commitments, such as in marriages, couples generally share a similar sense of humor, but these similarities are not associated with greater marital satisfaction. Nor are they directly connected with longer marriages. "Perhaps not surprisingly, the research that resulted in this finding also found that couples with fewer children laugh more, compared to couples with a larger number of children," Greengross said.

"In another study, conducted with 3,000 married couples from five countries, both husbands and wives were found to be happier with a humorous partner, but this trait was reported to be more important for the marital satisfaction of the wives than the husbands. Interestingly, both husbands and wives thought that the husband was humorous more often. Regardless, married couples overwhelmingly say that humor has a positive impact on their marriages."

But what happens when things aren’t going so well? True, humor is a great ice breaker and a social lubricant, but it's not a universal solution for everything.

"In one study, researchers observed 60 newlywed couples when they discussed a problem in their marriage. They coded how much humor was used in the conversation. The couples also completed a measure of life stress. What researchers found when they followed up 18 months later was quite surprising. In couples that reported high stress, the more the husband used humor, the greater the chance the couple would separate or divorce," Greengross explained.

By contrast, in another study with 130 married couples, a wife’s use of humor predicted greater marital stability over six years, but only if it led to a decrease in their husband's heart rate too. In other words, if the wife can defuse the situation and calm her husband with humor, then it's beneficial to their marriage.

"These two studies show the disparate function of humor for men and women," Greengross said. "For men, humor might serve as a way to distract from dealing with problems in the relationship, perhaps in an attempt to reduce their own anxiety. Women, on the other hand, may use humor to create a more relaxed atmosphere that can facilitate reconciliation."

"In recent years, there has been much research on the topics of gelotophobia (the fear of being laughed at), gelotophilia (the joy of being laughed at), and katagelasticism (the joy of laughing at others)," the evolutionary psychologist pointed out.

"One study with a sample of 154 heterosexual young couples, who had been together an average of six years, examined whether any of these dispositions had a bearing on relationship satisfaction. You might expect that a person who likes being laughed at would be a good match with a partner that likes laughing at others, and this is indeed what the researchers discovered, though the correlation was not very strong. Overall, partners in romantic relationships tended to have similar preferences – they both liked being laughed at or laughing at others at similar levels."

"Looking at relationship satisfaction, people who scored high on gelotophobia reported the lowest satisfaction in their relationships, and felt less physically attractive, and less sexually satisfied, compared to low gelotophobians. This makes sense, as being in an intimate relationship requires opening up and being more vulnerable, something that may feel uncomfortable for a person fearing being judged and laughed at."