Ithaca Journal

Why are we so into being afraid?

By Kerry Lengel
Gannett News Service

November 1, 2006

A giant of the 20th century famously said, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” But here in the 21st, Franklin Roosevelt's words have been turned upside down.

From avian flu to Korean nukes, not to mention Osama bin Laden, we have plenty of very real fears. The one thing we don't seem to be afraid of is “fear itself.”

Just go to the movies, where millions of Americans are watching “The Grudge 2” and the latest “Texas Chainsaw,” or to the bookstore, where they're buying endless tales of vampires, ghosts and serial killers. Every day, we pay good money to be afraid.

“Horror comes and goes in popularity, and right now it's on a huge upswing,” says author David Morrell, who's released the paperback of his bestselling “Creepers,” a modern take on the old haunted-house story, in time for Halloween.

“I think the reason for it is that in life we are feeling that we are in such desperate straits, that life is sort of horrifying these days, and that in a paradoxical way, fake horror gives us a kind of antidote to the real thing,” he says.

It's an interesting theory, although one that's pretty hard to prove. Last year did see a lot of horror flicks break into the Top 50 at the box office, from “Red Eye” to “White Noise,” not to mention “War of the Worlds.” On the other hand, 1999 was another big year for horror hits (“The Sixth Sense,” “The Blair Witch Project”), while 2003 —after the true terrors of Sept. 11 — only had a handful.

The truth is that horror has been a staple of pop culture ever since there was such a thing (think of the great German silent film of 1922, “Nosferatu, a Symphony of Horror”). It's no coincidence that the filmmaker many consider the greatest in Hollywood history, Alfred Hitchcock, was also the master of suspense.

There's really no mystery to the appeal of fictional fear, says Robert Thompson, professor of television and pop culture at Syracuse University. It all goes back to our prehistory on the savannah.

“Human beings are at a stage in their evolution where they are still physiologically wired to be in constant danger,” he says. “Our bodies have not yet caught up with the comparative safety provided by civilization. With brains ready to be chased by a saber-toothed tiger or frightened by a wide variety of natural phenomena, our daily lives seldom exercise these capabilities. If the world is not presenting real danger, we manufacture artificial danger.
“Roller coasters, Stephen King movies, ghost stories ... are all efforts to get that feeling and adrenaline rush that fear provides, without the disadvantages of real, imminent danger.”

The monsters may be fake, but the body's reaction is real, triggering the fight-or-flight response of elevated heart rate and blood pressure, along with that all-important adrenaline.

“The heightened arousal produced by fear is physiologically similar to what occurs when someone takes pleasure-producing stimulants, such as coffee,” says Joseph Tecce, a psychology professor at Boston College. “The body responds in the same way during fear and intense pleasure.

“Furthermore, when someone is physiologically low — tired, bored or a little blue — the arousing effect of fear can be rewarding. When these physiological changes occur during fear that is safe, that is, when watching a Hitchcock movie at home in a secure setting with family and friends, the experience can be exciting and pleasurable.”

Most scientists agree that the safe-danger paradox explains why we enjoy scary stories and slasher movies. But Glenn Sparks, a Purdue University communication professor who studies media effects, says the idea of horror as “fun,” particularly around Halloween, has been overhyped.

In his surveys, only about a third of the people said they really enjoyed a good scare, and another third actively avoid it. One person's thrill ride is another's genuine nightmare.

Sparks says he is not even sure the people who enjoy the scary stuff know exactly what it is they like about it.
“Fear is a negative emotion,” he says. “I think what people are enjoying when they go to a frightening film are things that accompany that experience. They're not enjoying being scared...

“When you come out of the film, there is often a sense of relief. There is often a resolution to the fear, and there are often a variety of positive emotions if you're with your friends. You get a sense of having conquered it or mastered it. The arousal that's there in your body from the fear transfers to the positive emotion that you feel after it's over.”

Sparks' main concern is that people who have negative experiences with scary entertainment don't cave in to peer pressure, because the psychological effects can be real and long-lasting.

People also experience different types of horror differently, he says. There's a long distance between a spooky story like “The Sixth Sense” and the gory violence of “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre,” and some people who enjoy slasher flicks don't get scared at all but see them as silly, over-the-top fun.

“If you go back and read some of what Stephen King wrote on the philosophy of horror or fright, he makes a distinction of different levels of fear,” Sparks says. “High-pitched suspense has to do with character involvement in a way that the gross-out violence doesn't foster.

“When you care about what happens to that character, the filmmaker can really put you through the ringer psychologically. And that's what Hitchcock did so well.”