horror movie classification essay

The Codes and Conventions of Horror Films

Introduction.

Horror films often feature the dark and ominous atmospheres of dimly lit rooms, nightmarish music, and characters who should not be venturing down into their basements alone. Perhaps the house is cursed by malevolent spirts or the rural community is being terrorised by a masked maniac.

We enjoy watching horror films because they provoke a pleasing sort of terror.

It does not matter if the story takes place in an old graveyard, the haunted woods at the end of the lane, or in the vacuum of deep space where no one can hear you scream. The film just has to be scary. That is why Brigid Cherry (2009) argued the “function of horror to scare, shock, revolt or otherwise horrify the viewer” was more important to the definition of the genre compared to “any set of conventions, tropes or styles”.

As filmmakers continue to find new ways to frighten the audience, we are going to focus on the essential conventions and aesthetics of the genre , its enduring appeal, and why companies continue to profit from horror films.

The Iconography of Horror Films

Iconography refers to the pattern of signs which are closely associated with certain genres. We already know horror films are set in bleak and gloomy locations, such as haunted houses, abandoned buildings, small towns, and remote cabins in the woods. There is usually a sense of isolation and confinement in these dark spaces. The audience will expect to hear the wind howling across the desolate landscape and the old floorboards to creak with every step.

The poster for The Conjuring uses some of codes and conventions of horror to grab the audience’s attention. First, the title denotes paranormal tricks and demonic possession. The references to Saw and Insidious establishe the director’s genre credibility. Of course, the lonely farmhouse looks forsaken along the rough and misty trees. This isolation increases the sense of threat because its occupants will be helpless against the evil forces.

Perhaps the most sinister signifier is the noose tied to the bare and misshapen tree. Did you notice the shadow of the girl? The combination of these elements is the punctum designed to strike fear into the audience.

Finally, the macabre tone is reinforced by heavy, grey sky and the dying leaves scattered across the field. The poster is certainly trying to make the audience feel uneasy and want to experience this nightmare for themselves.

Many horror posters will contain variations of this fusion of codes – their settings and props will be just as menacing. We might see incomplete glimpses of the monster, such as a close up of its hideous fangs or its shadow cast against the wall, so its reveal will be shocking when it appears the big screen.

In his discussion on genre, Steve Neale (1980) wrote “all the resources of the costume and make-up department are mobilised” in horror films to “frighten and terrify” the audience. These monsters are coming to get you, Barbara.

Most of the characters will not make it to the closing credits, but another common trope in horror movies is the “final girl”. She is the last survivor of a group of friends who defeats villain. Inevitably, there will be plenty of guts and gore along the way.

Technical Codes

Imagine paying a penny in the early days of cinema to see the black and white film stock being projected onto the large screen. There is no doubt that flickering, spectral quality made the characters and settings seem scarier. Even more recent films shot on digital cameras, such as The Blair Witch Project or 28 Days Later , can give the footage a gritty reality which will terrify the audience.

The genre has always exploited a range of filmmaking techniques to elicit fear.

Music and Sound Effects

A lot of effort and innovation goes into creating a scary mix of dialogue, effects, and music.

Orchestral scores are a familiar, unnerving presence in horror films. Dissonant chords and demonic whispers help create the unsettling atmospheres and deepen our understanding of the characters. How many times have you heard the music build to a crescendo during moments of high tension, such as a frenetic chase scene, or jump scares punctuated by sudden and jarring sounds? Composers will also use motifs to signal the arrival of certain events – epitomised by John William’s famous theme each time the shark appears in Jaws .

Another famous piece of music is Bernard Hermann’s score for Psycho which uses an amazing range of deep bass sounds and screeching violins to great effect. Perhaps the budget was only enough for string instruments. This article by Aaron Gilmartin is a good introduction to the composition and contains relevant extracts from the film.

Synthesisers became popular in horror films produced in the 1980s because they were more cost-effective. Listen to John Carpenter’s distinctive theme for Halloween – its disturbing pattern of pulses will have you looking over your shoulders. 

Music can enhance the emotional impact of a horror film, but diegetic sound is just as important. When the protagonist moves down the dark hallway of the farmhouse, the audience will expect to hear the nerve-tingling creaks of old floorboards – the awful silence in between each footstep should emphasise the character’s vulnerability. The sound of a distant clock ticking can develop a sense of impending danger and the awful buzz of chainsaw will surely disturb any viewer.

An interesting example is the motion tracking beep in Aliens when the increasing speed indicates the vicious monsters are getting closer and closer.

This scene also stresses the importance of dialogue. Private Hudson counts down to 6 and Ripley exclaims, “That can’t be. That’s inside the room.” The effective use of sound can be the difference between a good horror film and a truly terrifying one.

Lighting Design

Lighting sets the tone of the film. Bright and well-lit scenes feel safe, comforting and uplifting. By contrast, dark and dimly lit spaces create a sense of uncertainty and danger by playing on our natural fear of the unknown. When a character is alone in the dark, they are cut off from others which should make them seem more vulnerable.

Filmmakers also use deep shadows to obscure details and only show glimpses of the horror. Leaving the signifier to the viewer’s imagination can be more terrifying than actually seeing the monster or villain.

Light can be just as effective in creating a sense of dread and unease. A harsh spotlight might draw attention to a character’s face, making their frightened expression more intense for the viewer, or a flicking strobe light could highlight the monster’s erratic movements. Have you ever held a torch under your face while you told your friends a ghost story? This effect is called uplighting.

Consider the lighting design in this scene from The Conjuring which relies on light bulbs and matches to terrify the audience.

Derived from the Italian words chiaro (light) and scuro (dark), the term chiaroscuro refers to the use of strong contrasts between light and dark in a composition. In horror films, the effect can make the viewer feel incredibly anxious about what is lurking in those shadows.

This iconic shot from The Exorcist makes excellent use of the technique.

The image of Father Merrin arriving at the home to perform the exorcism was used all over the world for the film’s original poster. Symbolising the intense battle between good and evil, the chiaroscuro draws our attention to the connection between the silhouetted priest and the room where the demon has possessed the innocent girl.

By manipulating light and shadow, filmmakers can deliver a cinematic experience that is both visually striking and emotionally terrifying.

Framing the Horror

In cinematography, framing refers to the way the image is composed within the boundaries of the screen. Filmmakers have to decide what to include in the shot and how to arrange those elements in the frame to elicit the right response from the audience.

Wide shots are used to establish the setting, but they can also encode a sense of isolation and vulnerability by showing the characters in large, empty spaces. If a director wants the audience to connect with a character’s fear, they can tighten the camera into a close up of their face. Close ups are often used to highlight details of a monster’s face or body to make it more terrifying. The audience might even feel like they are the ones being hunted by the monster when the director cuts to a point-of-view shot.

Low-angle shots can make the villains appear larger and more powerful, while high-angle shots can make victims seem small and exposed. Tilted angles are disorientating and disrupt our comfortable view of the world.

Camera Movement and Editing

The process of selecting, arranging, and manipulating the different shots into a congruent narrative or visual sequence is called editing. These decisions can make or break a horror film. Have a look at the opening shots of It Follows .

The wide frame pans around the suburban street suggesting there is some sort of invisible danger stalking the young girl. There is a tremendous sense of dread encoded in that shot. The first take lasts an unnerving one minute and fifty seconds before we cut to an interior shot of the car. It is an over the shoulder shot. When Annie turns around to see if she is being followed, the fear is obvious in her eyes.

The third shot is another wide frame. She looks completely lost in that horizon between the sand and black sky. Even in the next shot, which is tighter on the character, encodes her vulnerability.

Annie reacts to the hidden threat, and we cut to a POV shot. The lights of the car make it appear demonic, especially the red taillights. Perhaps the evil force is hidden in the empty spaces either side. Then there is the shock cut. The appearance of her broken body is sudden and unexpected. Horrifying.

In this next sequence, the protagonist is in school when she notices a strange figure in the distance.

The slow push in, which moves the audience closer to the window, is intercut with Jay’s increasing anxiety. The more the old woman dominates the frame, the greater the threat. Jay’s distress is reinforced by the close up and then wide frame of her awkwardly leaving class.

The Steadicam follows her around the school corridor. This camera movement suggests she is disorientated by her distress, especially the image of her walking away from the lens cutting to a shot of her walking towards the audience.

When she realises the old woman is in the corridor, the smoother camera dolly pulls back in each shot, almost invading the audience’s space. The series of quick cuts intensifies the conflict between the characters.

The Interplay of Codes

Steve Neale (1980) argued cinema was a “semiotic process” and meaning was constructed through the “interplay of codes”. Horror films are “specific variations” of these codes. It is the combination of scary visual elements, frightening music and diegetic sound, careful lighting design, and cinematography which provokes that pleasing sort of terror we want to experience when we sit down in our comfortable seats to watch a horror film.

The Narrative of Horror

Horror films explore a variety of themes that tap into our deepest fears and anxieties, raise questions regarding our mortality and what lies beyond, and depict the darker aspects of human nature. Some stories explore the psychological impact of trauma, often featuring characters who are struggling with past events or mental illness. Other films feature a vengeful antagonist seeking revenge for perceived wrongs, creating a sense of moral ambiguity and justice.

Neale (1980) suggested “the disruptions in horror films are often violent”. The gruesome monster attacks the isolated village, a wicked demon takes possession of an innocent child, or a crazed killer begins their terrible revenge on the group of teenagers. Moving the narrative into a state of disequilibrium , these inciting incidents are “often linked to questions about being human and what is natural”.

The narratives obviously rely on action codes – the protagonist closes the bathroom cabinet to reveal the stalker is standing behind them or the vicious dogs chase our heroes through the foggy cemetery.

The Conjuring’s poster also draws attention to the film’s use of enigma codes with the reference to the “true case files of the Warrens”. The two demonologists, Ed and Lorraine Warren, agree to investigate the origins of the dark forces which are haunting the farmhouse. They soon discover the terrible story of the witch and her unholy sacrifices to the devil.

The Japanese horror film Ringu is also driven by enigma codes because the protagonist is a journalist who sets out to uncover the truth about a series of bizarre deaths. The clues lead her the tragic story of Sadako who could project her rage onto video tapes.

We might try to classify horror films into the genre of order because the central conflicts are “externalized, translated into violence, and usually resolved through the elimination of some threat to the social order”. In many early Hollywood studio productions, the monsters were defeated by the end of the story, providing reassuring and confident messages to the audience. More recently, in The Conjuring , for example, the curse is lifted and the witch is condemned to hell. Despite The Mist’s incredibly grim ending, the army are exterminating the creatures and saving the world.

Thomas Schatz (1981) suggested a “genre film’s resolution may reinforce the ideology of the larger society”. He also emphasised the narratives could “challenge and criticize” our values. Perhaps that is why horror films tend to have more ambiguous conclusions.

A great example is when Damien turns to the camera in The Omen , breaking the fourth wall, and smiles at the audience. The image of the devil relishing his victory leaves us with despair.

Horror Subgenres and Hybrids

Cherry (2009) argued the horror genre was “constantly shifting” with “new conceptual categories in order to keep on scaring the audience”. Her outline of these subgenres is a good summary of the different forms of horror.

The Gothic refers to films based on classic tales of horror, often adapting pre-existing horror monsters or horrifying creatures from novels and mythology. Cherry classified films which involved “interventions of spirits, ghosts, witchcraft, the devil, and other entities into the real world” as supernatural, occult and ghost films.

Psychological horror films explore psychological states and psychoses, including criminality and serial killers. Monster movies feature invasions of the everyday world by natural and extra-terrestrial creatures leading to death and destruction. Slashers portray groups of teenagers menaced by a stalker, set in domestic and suburban spaces. There are also body horror and splatter films, including postmodern zombie stories.

Filmmakers borrow codes and conventions from other genres, such as science fiction, war and even westerns, to find new ways of terrifying the audience.

Finally, Cherry noted “what might be classed as the essential conventions of horror to one generation may be very different to the next”, so the genre will continue to diversify and fragment.

What Makes Horror Films Appealing?

Horror films are constructed to provoke negative emotions from the audience. Some people find the stories too scary and distressing to be enjoyable, but others are eager to experience that thrill of being frightened for many different reasons. Some horror franchises even have dedicated fandoms .

Going to the cinema for a good scare is a chance to escape the horrors in our own lives. In terms of the uses and gratifications theories, this motivation is called diversion. As well as being entertaining, watching a horror film with family or friends can create a shared experience and develop our personal relationships. It is almost a rite of passage for two young lovers on a romantic date to protect each other from the frightening images on the big screen.

Horror films can also be life-affirming because they empower the audience to confront and process their fears in a safe environment. Many story arcs conclude when the evil presence is destroyed, and a new equilibrium is established. Seeing the protagonist defeat the supernatural villain might inspire us to overcome the lack in our own lives.

There might be even deeper psychological explanations for our desire to watch horror films. For instance, Sigmund Freud (1919) argued the “uncanny” signifiers in fairy tales, such as severed hands and re-animation of the dead, could help readers resolve some of the emotional disruptions they experienced in childhood. He also suggested the supernatural themes challenged our rational view of the world and allowed us to imagine spaces beyond our own mortality: “it is no matter for surprise that the primitive fear of the dead is still so strong within us and always ready to come to the surface at any opportunity”.

Sometimes horror films raise interesting questions about our values and ideologies . For instance, The Dawn of the Dead is set in a large shopping mall and is an obvious criticism of our culture of consumerism. Other films might present concerns about the collapse of morality in society.

Of course, some people are simply fascinated by the darker aspects of human nature. When it comes to the gory and visceral horror stories, some thrill-seekers like to push the limits of what is acceptable.

Finally, we can appreciate horror films for their artistic value, especially when filmmakers challenge the conventions of the genre and produce something new.

Scary Profits

Although the industry seems full of creativity and glamour, making films comes with huge financial risks. Some productions will generate significant profits while many others will suffer substantial losses.

Keith Barry Grant (1986) described how the “profit-motivated studio system” in Hollywood “adopted an industrial model based on mass production” and attempted to exploit “commercially successful formulas”. If a particular style of film did well at the box office, the studios would try to replicate that success in their next feature. For instance, Universal Pictures developed Dracula , Frankenstein , and The Mummy in the early 1930s to satisfy the audience’s increasing demand for fantasy horror films. These hits were soon followed by the inevitable sequels Dracula’s Daughter , Son of Frankenstein , and a series of stories based on Kharis, an Egyptian mummy.

In his analysis of the Hollywood studios, David Hesmondhalgh (2013) described three important strategies the production companies used to “minimise the danger of misses” and ensure a return on their investment. This formatting process included a focus on star power, genre films and the development of franchises.

Neale (1980) suggested we liked to repeat our experiences of genre films because “pleasure lies in both the repetition of the signifiers and the fundamental differences”, so producers know there is always an audience ready for the next scary story. It is also worth noting horror films have a clear identity which can make the advertising message more effective.

Importantly, horror films do not need large production budgets. They usually have shorter run times which means less footage needs to be shot and edited. If the story takes place in a single location, such as a haunted house, the production company might save money on fewer sets. The producers can also reduce costs by featuring lesser-known actors.

As long as the genre remain profitable, producers will continue to make horror films.

Cherry, Brigid (2009): “Horror”. Freud, Sigmund (1919): “The Uncanny”. Grant, Barry Keith (1986): “Film Genre Reader”. Hesmondhalgh, David (2013): “The Cultural Industries”. Neale, Steve (1980): “Genre”. Schatz, Thomas (1981): “Hollywood Genres Formulas, Filmmaking, and The Studio System”.

Further Reading

Music Videos and Genre

Iconography

Steve Neale and Genre Theory

Genres of Order and Integration

Thanks for reading!

Recently Added

The Grand Syntagma of Cinema

The Kuleshov Effect

Rule of Thirds

Key concepts.

• David Gauntlett and Identity

Psychographics

Mode of Address

Media studies.

• The Study of Signs
• Ferdinand de Saussure and Signs
• Roland Barthes
• Charles Peirce’s Sign Categories
• Jean Baudrillard’s Simulacra and Simulation
• Binary Opposition
• Vladimir Propp
• Tzvetan Todorov
• Quest Plots
• Barthes’ 5 Narrative Codes
• Key Concepts in Genre
• Paul Gilroy
• Liesbet van Zoonen
• The Male Gaze
• The Bechdel Test
• bell hooks and Intersectionality
• The Cultural Industries
• Hypodermic Needle Theory
• Two-Step Flow Theory
• Cultivation Theory
• Stuart Hall’s Reception Theory
• Abraham Maslow
• Uses and Gratifications
• Moral Panic
• Camera Shots
• Indicative Content
• Statement of Intent
• AQA A-Level
• Exam Practice

Subgenres of Horror Films Explained

What’s Your Favorite Genre of Horror?

Horror is one of the most entertaining and studied genres in filmmaking. The threshold to make a horror film is relatively low. It’s an opportunity for creatives to experiment with effects and revive folklore storytelling devices. Filmmakers use many methods of manipulation to heighten horror and make the viewer fear whatever is coming next. Depending on the intended reaction, some techniques include the classic jump scare, mounting suspense, and over-extended scenes to make audiences squirm in their seats a little longer. These movie techniques are frequently used in almost all subgenres of horror films. People are drawn to horror movies because there isn’t just one type of horror film —there are many.

Horror includes many subgenres that date back to the beginning of film history. Take for instance the silent era of filmmaking. Nosferatu (1922) was the first film to feature the vampire, a European folklore figure that exists on the warm blood of a living victim. Vampires are now ubiquitous in the horror movie genre and have hit the mainstream with blockbuster movies such as The Twilight series.

October is the harbinger of horror, but one does not need to wait for a certain season to enjoy a rush of adrenaline from a good scary movie. Here are the popular subgenres of horror films viewers can enjoy year round.

10 Popular Subgenres of Horror Films 

Demonic possession.

Sometimes thought of as supernatural horror, this subgenre plays into the unknown of the human experience. Demons have been part of historical storytelling for centuries. They represent evil in many forms including mythical, religious and supernatural. One of the most known demonic movie examples of all time is William Friedkin’s 1973 movie The Exorcist . Pazuzu , the main demon, is never actually mentioned in the movie, but is arguably the best-known demon of today’s horror movies. As the star character in The Exorcist , Pazuzu is an ancient mythological demon in Mesopotamia who possessed Regan MacNeil played by Linda Blair. The movie skyrocketed Pazuzu to Hollywood fame and helped shape the demonic genre of horror in modern moviemaking.

Paranormal horror is closely related to the demonic subgenre in that it focuses on characters who aren’t living beings. Spirits and ghosts spook viewers and create fear without a physical presence on screen. For example, furniture moves without anyone touching it or a chill passes through the air out of nowhere. Those are elements of paranormal activity that can be from a demon spirit, supernatural power or ghost. Paranormal Activity , The Conjuring , The Amityville Horror , The Omen , Carrie , and Poltergeist are all examples from the Paranormal subgenre.

Vampires, aliens, and giant sea creatures are all antagonists in the Monster movie genre. Unlike their supernatural counterparts, monsters can wreak havoc on a community of people in one fell swoop. Monsters terrorize and kill whatever is in their path and use their strength and size to destroy. Universal Studios popularized the monster genre in Hollywood from the 1930s and ‘50s with Frankenstein, Dracula, the Creature of the Black Lagoon, and many other iconic monsters. Before Universal found success in making horror films, it wasn’t considered a big player during Hollywood’s early years. Once they discovered that audiences loved to be thrilled and simultaneously terrorized by giant monsters, the studio built a media franchise around their monster movies. Today, when you visit the Universal Studios backlot, you’ll see a giant mural with popular monsters painted on an outdoor wall.

Slasher movies focus on villains who are human. Slasher villains are usually serial killers and typically have a high body count by the end of the movie. They stalk their victims and brutally murder the film’s protagonist(s) and anyone who gets in their way. Freddy Krueger, Michael Myers, and Jason Voorhees (better known as Jason) are iconic slasher villains in horror film history. John Carpenter’s 1978 cult classic movie Halloween ushered in the era of masked serial killers as part of the slasher movies genre. Audiences are particularly terrified by the slasher genre because of how close to reality these fictionalized villains make viewers feel.

Zombie movies cross multiple horror subgenres. One part monster movie, one part possession, zombie thrillers make a perfect cocktail of terror. Somehow they are the most difficult villain to kill off and just keep coming back for more. These corpse-like characters are cannibalistic by nature and can infect their victims with a single bite. Shows like The Walking Dead created a cult following for the zombie genre of horror. With 11 seasons spanning from 2010 to 2021, The Walking Dead TV series showcased a horrifying post-apocalyptic story of zombie invasions. The success of the show has kept audiences interested in zombie horror that will likely continue for years to come.

Gore (Splatter)

Also known as the splatter genre, gore is all about the portrayal of graphic violence. Blood, guts and body trauma are classic elements in gore movies. Films in the gore category rely heavily on special effects to disfigure body parts. New filmmakers can experiment with effects and get creative with theatrical makeup. This genre is the most gratuitous of all horror films when it comes to violence and the dismemberment of characters. Classic examples of gore movies include Sam Raimi’s The Evil Dead and Eli Roth’s Cabin Fever .

Witches have a long history of mischief in folklore. They use the power of magic to cast spells on their victims turning them into all kinds of tortured beings. Similar to the paranormal genre, witchcraft uses supernatural elements to create fear. Movies like The Witch and Susperia are great examples of the terror caused by witches.

English literature popularized vampire stories, which were basically just ghost stories of the dead returning to haunt the living. It wasn’t until the slowburn success of Dracula that helped launch vampire stories into the mainstream. There have been countless low-budget Dracula movies throughout the years including Horror of Dracula , The Brides of Dracula , Dracula’s Dog . One of the more successful vampire movies (besides, the Twilight Series) is Neil Jordan’s adaptation of the 1976 novel Interview with a Vampire . A young Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt play vampires. The film focuses on Lestat (Cruise) and Louis (Pitt), beginning with Louis’s transformation into a vampire by Lestat in 1791.

Psychological

Psychological horror is not about what we see on the screen but how it makes us feel. This genre plays tricks on the viewers’ mind by creating paranoia. A viewers’ emotional state is heavily influenced by psychological horror. Since this type of horror can feel a little too real compared to the other genres (gore and monsters), people may walk away feeling uneasy. The main characters in these types of horror movies are mentally unstable or emotionally disturbed to the point of being violent. One of the best examples of the psychological horror genre is Stanley Kurbrick’s The Shining starring Jack Nicholoson. From the beginning of the movie you can see Jack Torrence slowly turn more mad with each developing scene.

Comedic horror is possibly the most fun of all horror movies out there. It’s a subgrene that is equally funny as it is scary. It takes the viewer to complete opposite ends of the horror spectrum resulting in a rollercoaster of emotions. Classic examples of comedy-horror films include Scream , Shuan of the Dead , and The Cabin in the Woods.

Find Out More

• Request More Info
• Book a Tour
• High School Outreach
• Academic Catalog
• Call: 323-860-0789
• Toll Free: 888-688-5277
• Campus Alerts
• COVID-19 FAQ
• Careers at L.A. Film School

Students & Alumni

• Student Portal
• Student FAQs
• Academic Calendar
• Student Records
• Student Store
• Alumni Network
• Career Development
• Make a payment
• Graduation FAQ
• Request Transcripts

Disclosures / Legal

• Accreditation/Approvals
• BPPE Annual Report
• Campus Safety
• Consumer Disclosures
• Do not sell my personal information
• Financial Aid Consumer Information
• Privacy Policy
• School Performance Fact Sheets
• Service Animal Policy
• Title IX Training Materials
• Website Accessibility Statement

• Screenwriting \e607
• Directing \e606
• Cinematography & Cameras \e605
• Editing & Post-Production \e602
• Documentary \e603
• Movies & TV \e60a
• Producing \e608
• Distribution & Marketing \e604
• Festivals & Events \e611
• Fundraising & Crowdfunding \e60f
• Sound & Music \e601
• Games & Transmedia \e60e
• Grants, Contests, & Awards \e60d
• Film School \e610
• Marketplace & Deals \e60b
• Off Topic \e609
• This Site \e600

Defining the Horror Genre in Movies and TV

The horror genre in film and television is one of the most popular money makers. let's dig deeper. .

If you were going to bet on an original movie to be a box-office hit, what genre would you pick? The truth is, there is only one genre that again and again provides hits across both film and television. It's horror.

Even before Jason Blum became one of the most powerful producers in Hollywood, horror has been a valuable bet. Alfred Hitchcock dabbled in the darkness with Psycho , but prior to Norman Bates, we had the Universal monster movies and things like The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari .

The horror subgenres are aplenty, and we'll get to them later.

Horror has been around since someone could hold a movie camera. And it's not just on the big screen. We also had shows like The Twilight Zone and Tales from the Crypt scaring our pants off at home.

So today I want to look at the horror genre in movies and television. We'll explore examples, look at current things on the air and in theaters, and talk about why these stories continue to terrify and entertain us.

The Horror Genre Definition

Horror is a genre of film and television whose purpose is to create feelings of fear, dread, disgust, and terror in the audience. The primary goal is to develop an atmosphere that puts the audience on edge and scares them.

Where does the word "horror" come from?

The term actually came from the Old French word " orror," which meant “to shudder or to bristle.”

Horror filmmaking has roots in religions across the world, local folktales, and history. It's a universal genre. Every culture has its scary stories and fears. These elements are meant to exploit the viewer and engage them with the possibility of death and pain.

Most importantly, to be a true horror project, your story should deal in the supernatural. Death, evil, powers, creatures, the afterlife, witchcraft, and other diabolical and unexplainable happenings must be at the story's center.

There is some debate over whether this stuff needs to be supernatural to divide horror from thriller... but we will let you work that out in the comments.

Creeping Around the Horror Genre in Movies and TV

Ghouls, ghosts, slashers, creatures, and gore. Horror film and television focus on adrenaline rides for the audience that dial up the blood, scares, and creative monsters. Horror is always re-inventing old classics, like adding fast zombies and CGI creatures. It also is seen as the most bankable genre with a huge built-in audience.

Horror movies and shows consistently do well.

They have passionate fans, launch successful franchises, and get people excited.

The History of Horror in Film and TV

Even before the earliest cameras were made, people were telling spooky stories.

What was the first horror movie ever? Well, as far as we know, the first horror movie was made by French filmmaker Georges Melies, and was titled Le Manoir Du Diable (AKA The Devil's Castle/The Haunted Castle ). It was made in 1896 and was only about two minutes long.

What's striking to me is that even then, we had certain tropes. That movie contained a flying bat, a medieval castle, a cauldron, a demon figure, and skeletons, ghosts, and witches. There was even a crucifix to destroy the evil.

These kinds of movies and TV shows were initially inspired by literature from authors such as Edgar Allan Poe, Bram Stoker, and Mary Shelley.

Horror has existed as a film genre for more than a century. And things keep changing with the times.

Horror films often reflect where we are as a society and are a good way to track progress and social consciousness.

Check out the infographic below that shows the evolution of the horror film and TV shows.

Tropes and Expectations

The final girl, the "not dead yet" scare, and the dystopian endings.

Horror is famous for having story beats that we come to expect, like jumpscares. Filmmakers must lean into them, but also find ways to subvert. You have subsets of these tropes like haunted houses, slashers, zombies, evil creatures, and others. Each comes with a set of rules.

Scream famously subverts many of these tropes by making its characters aware of them, in a meta sense. This keeps the audience on the edge of their seat. Anyone could die in this world, and anyone could be the killer.

Another film that subverts slasher tropes is Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon . In it, characters address things like the apparent superpowers slashers have. How do they always seem to be one step behind the heroine? It makes for a very different kind of horror film.

Elements of Horror

People go to these movies and shows because they want to feel their heart beating out of control. They want the scare, but also the relief and enjoyment that comes after.

What are some basic elements they might expect?

General elements include ghosts , extraterrestrials , vampires , werewolves , demons, Satanism , evil clowns , gore, torture, vicious animals, evil witches , monsters, giant monsters , zombies, cannibalism , psychopaths , and serial killers.

Horror Subgenres

Horror is a genre that encompasses a wide range of subgenres, each with its own unique themes, tropes, and styles. Here are some of the most notable subgenres within horror:

• Gothic Horror: Known for eerie settings such as haunted castles, it emphasizes terror and suspense. Notable works include Dracula and Frankenstein .
• Psychological Horror: This subgenre focuses on the unstable psychological states of characters. Films like Psycho and The Shining are prime examples.
• Slasher Horror: Features a serial killer as the antagonist who systematically murders people. Key films in this category are Halloween and Friday the 13th .
• Supernatural Horror: Involves supernatural entities like ghosts and demons. Classic examples are The Exorcist and Poltergeist .
• Science Fiction Horror: A mix of science fiction and horror, often featuring aliens or dystopian futures. Alien and The Thing stand out in this subgenre.
• Body Horror: Centers on the distortion or transformation of the human body. Films such as The Fly and Hellraiser exemplify this style.
• Found Footage Horror: The film is presented as discovered video recordings. Notable examples include The Blair Witch Project and Paranormal Activity .
• Monster Horror: Focuses on mythical or scientifically mutated monsters. Iconic films in this subgenre are Godzilla and Jaws .
• Zombie Horror: Features zombies, typically resulting from an epidemic. Night of the Living Dead and 28 Days Later are key films in this category.
• Survival Horror: Emphasizes survival in hostile environments. Examples include The Descent and The Ruins .

Each of these subgenres brings a unique flavor to the horror genre, offering a diverse range of terrifying experiences for audiences.

Horror is such a malleable genre that you can mash it up with almost anything. There are subgenres that involve different kinds of monsters, and there are subgenres that pull in other elements. You can see movies and shows that involve comedy, body, folk history, found footage, Gothic elements, natural elements, slasher, teen, psychological, gore, and many others I'm sure you'll tell me about in the comments.

Here's what you really need to know. There are four main horror areas: Killers, Monsters, Paranormal, and Psychological Horror.

Everything else kind of fits underneath them.

What are Horror Genre Characteristics?

Horror film and TV shows are designed to frighten and panic audiences. You want people leaving theaters or hiding while watching shows because you've invoked our hidden worst fears, often in a terrifying, shocking finale.

The AMC site defines horror as, "Whatever dark, primitive, and revolting traits that simultaneously attract and repel us are featured in the horror genre. Horror films are often combined with science fiction when the menace or monster is related to a corruption of technology, or when Earth is threatened by aliens. The fantasy and supernatural film genres are not synonymous with the horror genre, although thriller films may have some relation when they focus on the revolting and horrible acts of the killer/madman. Horror films are also known as chillers, scary movies, spookfests, and the macabre."

Examples of the Horror Genre in Movies and TV

When we look at movies and TV show within this genre it's hard to narrow down the perfect list of examples. There are so many horror moves and TV shows to pick from, but I wanted to highlight a few here.

I think these are shows and films that you can classify as straight horror, no mashups.

First, Netflix just dropped The Haunting of Bly Manor , a spiritual sequel to their The Haunting of Hill House . From the mind of Mike Flanagan , it takes typical haunted house stories and turns them into a series.

Overall, horror on TV is hard, because you have to develop it in multiple episodes. Usually, mashups work best here, so there's more to talk about. Something like Lovecraft Country excels by using every episode to dig deeper into the horrors of Lovecraft.

When it comes to the cinema, there are thousands I can pick from.

We have horror adaptations like The Shining , or from Mike Flanagan again... Doctor Sleep .

I think Hitchcock's Psycho was so important to the jumps and scares we see today. Or a slow burn like The Sixth Sense , which rocketed the genre forward and helped it be taken seriously again. That hadn't really happened since The Exorcist .

How about Mary Harron 's take on the dark underbelly of corporate America in American Psycho ? There is a wealth of fresh perspectives to be found in the work of horror directors like Karyn Kusama , Coralie Fargeat, and Jennifer Kent.

Of course, we can look at franchises like Nightmare on Elm Street and Scream and even The Conjuring and see how horror takes off and becomes part of the cultural lexicon.

Movies and shows like this take off because audiences cannot get enough of the thrills and chills. Whether it's the spooky season or now, horror can take over and keep people on edge. You can release these movies around any time of year, and they can be a hit.

You can put them on streamers and find their audience.

And you can mash them up with every other genre and create something new and exciting.

Mash-up Potential for the Horror Genre

Some subgenres of horror film include comedy horror, folk horror, body horror, found footage, holiday horror, psychological horror, science fiction horror, slasher, supernatural horror, Gothic horror, natural horror, zombie horror, and teen horror.

These all open you up to mashing up other genres with horror. Creative mixes help capture the horror audience and put a spin on the tropes.

Think about movies like The Mummy , which adds adventure. Or even something like Shaun of the Dead , which adds comedy.

Or what about a show like Dexter ? Police procedural meets serial killer.

Summing up the Horror Genre in Movies and TV

It's hard to look at a genre like this and not feel the awe of human terror. We have so many things we are afraid of, and we put them all out into the open for audiences to relate to. Horror is evolving as more and more people get voices.

We read and see new stories every day. Horror is one of our most interesting genres because it continues to change with the times. It's always in flux, and it's always going to be with us.

From the works of Jordan Peele to a movie like Promising Young Woman , horror allows you to get something off your chest and find audiences who relate. So what do you have to say? And can you say it with blood spatter?

Horror might be for you.

What's next? Learn every film genre !

Film and TV genres affect who watches your work, how it's classified, and even how it's reviewed. So how do you decide what you're writing? And which genres to mash-up? The secret is in the tropes.

Click the link to learn more!

Dig this spooky post? Then check out the rest of our Horror Week coverage for more tips, tricks, and terrifying takes.

• What Does the Horror Genre Mean to Two Legendary Horror Masters? ›
• What Is the Cosmic Horror Genre in Film and TV? (Definitions and Examples) ›
• The Ultimate Guide to Horror Subgenres ›
• Genre type list ›
• What Is the First Horror Film? | No Film School ›
• About - What is Horror? - LibGuides at The Westport Library ›
• What Is Horror Fiction? Learn About the Horror Genre, Plus 7 ... ›
• Horror film - Wikipedia ›

Can You Make a Movie For Under $300 That's Accepted by Slamdance?

The answer is yes. this is how the filmmakers behind all i've got and then some pulled it off..

Standup comedy and filmmaking have a lot in common. Sure, one is individual performance art and the other is a collaboratively made audio visual medium, but hear me out. Both are art forms incredibly hard to break into that are often thankless, requiring an indelible passion to "make it" in, as they say.

Something beautiful about the Slamdance darling All I've Got and Then Some is the way it captures the passion-driven ethos of both mediums in front of and behind the camera.

All I've Got and Then Some is a day in the life of Rasheed, a homeless standup comic on his way to his first paid gig. Shot documentary-style in a way that blends the likes of Kevin Smith and Sean Baker, it's a miracle of indie filmmaking. Rasheed Stephens, the star and centerpiece of the film, and Tehben Dean, documentary filmmaker and cinematographer, are credited for literally almost every role. And all for a budget of under $300.

Below, we chat with the filmmaking duo all about the trials and tribulations of making a feature with a minuscule budget, as well as a punk as heck anecdote on Rasheed's early days as an indie filmmaker.

Check it outtttt.

Editor's Note: the following interview is edited for length and clarity.

NFS Interviews Rasheed Stephens and Tehben Dean

No Film School: How did you guys kind of get the idea for the All I Want and Then Some ?

Tehben Dean: Rasheed had another film that I was going to shoot. We started to reach out to talent and stuff, but it lined up right around when the strikes were announced last year. So nobody's agent would talk to us, and so we were like, all right, well, what's next?

Then a week or so later I remembered that Rasheed pitched this idea for web series a couple years ago that was based on his experience when he first moved to LA, about this guy living in his car and dating a girl that lived two cars behind him. We could do that, but let's make it a feature, and more about the standup comedy experience.

Rasheed Stephens: I was thinking about that idea too, man. Tehben came up with the idea to make it a day in life of [a standup comic], and that way we could save time too. Also make it with a more effective budget, and more efficient as far as the storytelling.

NFS: Yeah, totally. It gave me a Clerks vibe a little bit.

Stephens: Oh yeah. I love Clerks .

NFS: It was almost a Sean Baker/ Clerks hybrid, which I thought was cool.

Dean: When we were editing Rasheed said, "you need to watch Tangerine ." And I had never seen Tangerine , and I waited to watch it until after we finished. I didn't want to be too influenced. Afterwards I was like, oh, that's a really good movie. A lot of people have commented on a similarity.

NFS: Did you guys shoot on iPhone like Tangerine ?

Dean: It was all shot on a RED Komodo. And then we had a little Hi8 [camcorder] that was mixed in throughout a few places.

Stephens: It is an amalgamation of all those films— Clerks, Tangerine, and Robert Rodriguez' El Mariachi .

Our whole crew is right there that you're looking at. Tehben was our sound guy. He was our gaffer. What else? AC, camera Op, and co-director. So that's the El Mariachi reference. We were Clerks because of the dialogue—we wanted everything to be grounded. We were Tangerine because of the innovativeness. We shot this film for under $300.

Dean: We just went out and did it. It was me, Rasheed, and we somehow managed to get 55 actors, which still kind of blows my mind, because I wasn't part of figuring that part out. But the fact that we got 55 actors in the film that we shot in one week, to me, is one of the more impressive aspects.

All I've Got and Then Some

Courtesy of STRONGWOMENINFILM

NFS: Yeah, absolutely. Were a lot of them comics that you knew from the comedy community, Rasheed?

Stephens: Some of them. I think about maybe 10 percent of people in the movie were comics. The rest of them were actors cast by our co-producer, Amaka. But you think that number is accurate, Tehben?

Dean: Yeah, probably 10, 15 percent. And then the rest were actors that Amaka cast. And then some friends of Rasheed's. There were a few people that I brought in.

We had to find people and most of the time we'd bring an actor in and they'd be there for two hours. We'd shoot their scene and then they'd take off apart from the main characters. We did a lot of scenes per day.

NFS: I feel like it'd be pretty segmented to be like. Did you know any of the employess that worked in the locations where you shot? Or did you kind of just ask, hey, is it cool to shoot a quick little scene here?

Dean: It was a combination. Some people we asked, a lot of the locations were ones we had access to or friends' places.

Stephens: So I'm not going to lie, that hotel thing—when I was homeless, I figured I could eat in the morning if I went to a Continental Breakfast. I didn't look like the homeless guy. I would get up, shave, I'd go work out, and then I'd go to a hotel.

One of the girls at the hotel I used to sneak in, she told me it's a good place where I can get a continental breakfast. We shot in there and that girl gave us permission.

So yeah, that was amazing.

NFS: Yeah, I love that guerilla style. Was that pretty stressful for you, Tehben, to be operating so many positions?

Stephens: Tehben volunteered that shit himself. Whatever scene I wasn't in I would try to hold some mics. I would try to be a swing guy if I could.

But, again, we didn't have the resources, so we had to use everything we had in our own wheelhouse.

Dean: We some some microphones and a couple of small lights. I've shot a ton of documentary over the last 10 years, and so working as a one man band is something I'm very used to doing. The audio part on the other hand was something—not that I didn't want to do—but it came down to [the fact] we couldn't afford to hire somebody. Also, I trusted myself more than bringing on someone who was willing to do it for free and didn't really know what they were doing.

That was probably the most stressful part to me. But my brother's a pro sound guy, but he lives in Portland and he was not available. He was on another job, but I was able to hit him up with questions. Then he did the post mix on it, so he was able to clean up my mess.

Stephens: Before we collaborated, both of us had a plethora of experience doing multiple different jobs. I've worked as a casting director, producer, writer, director. So once worked cohesively together, we became magical because we both knew we could do a plethora of jobs at different times.

Of course it wasn't easy, but it's fun when you're in it. We both lived in a process and started making up stuff on the fly. I love doing stuff like that.

Dean: I would also say that honestly, there's something very just fresh about working with no crew. It in a way, it limits what you can do, but in another way, it expands what you can do.

Because Rasheed was in most of the scenes and I was shooting, and so most of the time it was just I could shoot anywhere I wanted on set. I was never going to run into crew. I was never going to run into lights or trucks. There was so much freedom to be able to be there in the environment. And that was part of the whole idea, too, because I had this idea in my head for a very long time that I wanted to shoot a narrative film, but approach it shooting a documentary. Rasheed's story was the perfect idea for that, and it also facilitated us being able to do it with virtually no money. Because I have a camera package, I didn't really need other gear. I didn't really need a lot of other crew.

Dean: Also we can do it quickly, because I never planned to shoot coverage.

And just the freedom of going into a scene and having a lot of improvisational dialogue. We worked with the actors, figured out what the scene is—sometimes we had key lines that they would need to say or points to hit—but we worked that and then we'd run through it and then we would make adjustments. Run through it again.

Each time we did a take, I shot it. That was the only take I was ever going to get. And I never shot one piece of coverage because I knew in the edit it was going to be cut like a documentary. It's more rehearsed than a documentary. We did multiple take, but I wanted it to still like it was captured in real time. So sometimes there's some jump cuts in there, and there might be a couple of times in the film where I jump from one take to another.

NFS: Rasheed, did you feel like the uphill battle of making an indie film was at all similar to the grind of standup culture, if that makes sense?

Stephens: Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. Standup is a thankless art. And sometimes filmmaking industry is a thankless art. I think film has more instant gratification than comedy.

I always say comedy is the hardest art, because I know comics that are really good that have been doing it for 20 years and they still haven't cut through but still have the love to do it. With filmmaking, at least, let's just say you want to be a director, you can at least go out and get paid as a PA for a while to get some kind of compensation. With a comic there's nothing else you could do for work other than work at a comedy club. But how many comedy clubs are there? There's not that many.

So I think they do have similarities, but I think there's a slight difference [in so much that] monetary gain is kind of impossible until it becomes possible [with comedy].

Dean: I think there's big overlap. This is a universal thing too, is that it's something you do because you're passionate about it. It's very difficult, and there's only the certainty that if you don't try it, you won't succeed.

This film really is about that, the standup bit before people make it, but also I think anybody in the film industry can relate to what it's about because it's about following a dream and it's all the challenges and roadblocks that come up. It would be much easier to just quit and go home.

This was a very meta process for me because we made it out of that sort of desperation. And so we just like, alright, we're just going to do it. We're going to do it ourselves. I'm not going to ask permission from anybody. And we made it. And then once we finished it, we showed it to cast and crew and some audiences, and it got really good reception. We got into Slamdance.

NFS: That's awesome. Do you have any advice for filmmakers, or even comics or comedy filmmakers? Any demographic you guys want.

Stephens: Actually, it's crazy. We were going to reach out to you guys up at Slamdance because our journeys are like an exact personification the title "No Film School." My journey started as a standup comic, an actor, and nobody was booking me. So I decided to create my own roles.

So, true story, when I first moved to LA, I would hang out at LA Film School on Sunset Boulevard. I would start conversing and networking with some of the students, and I realized all of them had became this plateau. They had no ambitions, no desires. I'm like, hold on, you get this equipment for free and you guys only use it when you have a project? So I found a way to start sneaking in that school.

I would read scripts all day, and I would teach myself how to write scripts. I would use those scripts as templates, and I would use their computers because they had free Final Draft. I would write so many scripts.

And then—this is fucked up—but I stole somebody's student ID and I rented out a camera. I asked somebody I knew that could work a camera and we started shooting content. That's how much desire I had. It took six months for them to finally kick me out.

[But before that] for my first film, Coffee and Cabbage , we used their 400 seat state-of-the-art theater. I had my first screener there. I filled it out with 220 people and I didn't even go to that school.

When I tell people I have ambitions bigger than an elephant—that's the kind of desire I have. I to want to pursue this thing I love. I snuck into a school and possibly went to jail [for it].

NFS: That's an amazing punk film school story.

Dean: I would just say that if you truly believe it's what you want to do, then don't give up and don't wait for anybody to give you permission, because it's very easy to be like, "Oh, I need this, I need that." But the only way you learn is through experience and making mistakes, and then finding successes. So don't give up.

Keep at it if that is truly your passion, but it's going to be hard

NFS: And sneak into LA film school. I think that's the best advice.

The Ending of 'Shutter Island' Explained

The 'longlegs' ending explained, what are the best mystery movies of all time, is james gandolfini as tony soprano the greatest acting achievement of all time, blackmagic camera for android 1.1 adds support for more phones, collaborate for your edit more efficiently with avid huddle, how to build an artistic title sequence with dave mckean, quickly customize your licensed music with soundstripe’s new ai song editor, story beats are the backbone of your screenplay, what is the verbal irony definition.

24/7 writing help on your phone

To install StudyMoose App tap and then “Add to Home Screen”

Classification of Movies

Save to my list

Remove from my list

Classification of Movies. (2016, Dec 24). Retrieved from https://studymoose.com/classification-of-movies-essay

"Classification of Movies." StudyMoose , 24 Dec 2016, https://studymoose.com/classification-of-movies-essay

StudyMoose. (2016). Classification of Movies . [Online]. Available at: https://studymoose.com/classification-of-movies-essay [Accessed: 7 Sep. 2024]

"Classification of Movies." StudyMoose, Dec 24, 2016. Accessed September 7, 2024. https://studymoose.com/classification-of-movies-essay

"Classification of Movies," StudyMoose , 24-Dec-2016. [Online]. Available: https://studymoose.com/classification-of-movies-essay. [Accessed: 7-Sep-2024]

StudyMoose. (2016). Classification of Movies . [Online]. Available at: https://studymoose.com/classification-of-movies-essay [Accessed: 7-Sep-2024]

• 'I am Legend' Genre Classification Pages: 2 (321 words)
• Classification of Mental Disorders Pages: 3 (815 words)
• Classification of Constitution Pages: 4 (1076 words)
• Plant Leaf Classification Pages: 3 (695 words)
• A SURVEY ON EARLY LUNG CANCER DETECTION AND ITS CLASSIFICATION Pages: 7 (1989 words)
• Data Mining News Headlines Classification Tool Computer Science Essay Pages: 12 (3599 words)
• Optimizing Supply Chain Management: An In-Depth Analysis of ABC Classification Pages: 5 (1391 words)
• Phylum Phaeophyta: Characteristics, Structure, Classification Pages: 8 (2361 words)
• A Classification Of Residential Neighbourhoods Pages: 4 (1114 words)
• Fundus Image Classification Pages: 2 (418 words)

👋 Hi! I’m your smart assistant Amy!

Don’t know where to start? Type your requirements and I’ll connect you to an academic expert within 3 minutes.

“Halloween” (1978): A Film Analysis Essay

• To find inspiration for your paper and overcome writer’s block
• As a source of information (ensure proper referencing)
• As a template for you assignment

Introduction

Halloween as a classic example of the killer genre.

Halloween , the 1978 movie directed by John Carpenter, is considered to be an all-time classic of the horror genre. If a film’s greatness is defined by the combination of popularity and significance, then Halloween is “arguably, the most successful horror film in American history” (Knöppler, 2017, p.212). The reason why it is such a remarkable movie is the way Halloween satisfies the spectator who came to see the horror story by building up the tension and then releasing it via various tools and decisions.

Summary and Genre Classification

In order to identify which genre of horror Halloween belongs to, one needs to turn to an overview of the plot. Knöppler (2017) lays it out as follows: the year is 1978. Michael Myers, a young man, who killed his sister, has remained in a psychiatric hospital for the past fifteen years. On October 30 th , Michael escapes and drives back to his hometown, while his psychotherapist, Dr. Loomis, decides to track him down, knowing what danger he possesses. There, Myers, wearing a white mask, stalks female high-schoolers Laurie, Annie, and Lynda. On Halloween night, Myers kills Annie and Lynda, and attacks Laurie. Dr. Loomis arrives to the rescue and shoots Michael, but the body vanishes. The film ends with Myers’s heavy breathing – it is implied he has survived.

From the description it becomes evident which genre of horror this movie belongs to. Halloween is a classic example of the killer genre, which, consequently, features a killer – a human being or a supernatural creature – who, for some reason, hunts people. This perfectly fits the description of the antagonist, Michael Myers, who stalks teenage girls throughout the entire narrative in hopes to kill them.

Narration that Evokes Fear

Since the plot of the movies of the killer genre revolves around the murderer, it is only fair that the way his presence and actions are depicted is what makes the story horrifying. Catharsis, which is a crucial element of horror, occurs at the very end – and one is masterfully led up to it (The Psychology of Fear). One example, according to Knöppler (2017), would be the audiovisual presentation of Michael Myers. The first half of the movie only features him in long shots or extreme close ups, escalating tension. The music adds to it – non-diegetic sounds indicating danger accompany Michael’s appearances on the screen. His body language is almost absent and he rarely makes a sound; even his accessory is a mask with no expression. All this dehumanizes Myers and presents him as rather a shadow of the person, which provides a spine-chilling effect (Knöppler, 2017).

Another way to emotionally affect the audience is to adopt the camera to Michael’s point of view. Some have argued that this subjective camera use is one of John Carpenter’s more arguable choices since it makes the viewers active partakers in the violence depicted on the screen (Knöppler, 2017). Nevertheless, that might have been exactly what the director was going for: the spectator, walking in the killer’s shoes in low key lighting, realizes the danger and fears for the unsuspecting victims. The article Scared Witless (1999) speaks about the physiology of fear and the way our body reacts to being scared. Exploring what it is like to make the viewer feel as if they are actually a criminal about to murder might be another subject worth writing an article about. That is a smart move in terms of provoking a reaction.

One more tool to present the antagonist as someone not quite human is the way his psychiatrist, Dr. Loomis, talks about him. Doctor claims that Myers’ eyes are “the devil’s”, that he is evil – “purely and simply”, and refers to him as “it” rather than “he” (Knöppler, 2017). All that further establishes the killer as something different, which is often present in the monster genre of horror. Here the otherness is metaphorical and portrayed with the help of the director’s ideas and tricks.

The Monster’s Role

However, one might argue that there are ways to look at the underlying message that do not necessarily align with the laws of the horror genre. For instance, Myers’ role can be interpreted as that of the originator of justice rather than the classic role of peace-breaker. The reason for that is the fact that the girls killed are promiscuous – and the survivor is a typical virgin. In that sense the murderer serves as the “patriarchal father”, coming to murder in a side lighting, and that appeals to more conservative audiences, even though the horror genre is perceived to be as one breaking the barriers (Knöppler, 2017, p.223).

Fulfilling the Viewer’s Needs

Stephen King (1979) states that, when one encounters the genre of horror, they are not necessarily scared of the mythical and absurd; rather, it is the implications behind the stories that are terrifying. Granted, since Halloween stars a psychopath with a desire to kill – a much frequent occurrence than a vampire or a sea-monster – it is easier to imagine oneself in the exact same situation as the teenagers in the movie. Still, what is actually frightful are the hate and deliberation with which the killer pursues his victims – and the way it is presented from the artistic point of view.

Halloween is called a classic not simply because it grossed a big box-office or became immensely popular. It is due to the director John Carpenter’s vision, which helped him create a film full of effects that evoke an emotional reaction in the audience. The fact that it gained both the critical acclaim and the love of public is just the cherry on top.

King, Stephen. 2012. Night Shift . United States: Anchor Books.

Knöppler, Christian. 2017. The Monster Always Returns: American Horror Films and Their Remakes . Germany: transcript Verlag.

Scared Witless – The Physiology of Fear. Canada: Toronto Star, 1999.

The Psychology of Fear. Web.

• Film “Brazil” Structural Analysis
• "Family Relationships in What It Means to Say Phoenix Arizona" by S. Alexie
• August Wilson’s “Piano Lesson” and “Joe Turner’s come and gone”
• Wilson's Play "Joe Turner's Come and Gone" at Huntington Theatre
• Why Halloween Celebration Is Bad
• Sallah Shabati Film Directed by Ephraim Kishon
• Chapters 3 and 4 of “Directors Tell the Story” by Rooney & Belli
• Chapter 3 of “Making Movies” Book by Lumet
• Heidegger’s Analysis of Gestell in the Tenet Film
• The Pain and Body Issues in the Animals Film
• Chicago (A-D)
• Chicago (N-B)

IvyPanda. (2022, November 23). “Halloween” (1978): A Film Analysis. https://ivypanda.com/essays/halloween-1978-a-film-analysis/

"“Halloween” (1978): A Film Analysis." IvyPanda , 23 Nov. 2022, ivypanda.com/essays/halloween-1978-a-film-analysis/.

IvyPanda . (2022) '“Halloween” (1978): A Film Analysis'. 23 November.

IvyPanda . 2022. "“Halloween” (1978): A Film Analysis." November 23, 2022. https://ivypanda.com/essays/halloween-1978-a-film-analysis/.

1. IvyPanda . "“Halloween” (1978): A Film Analysis." November 23, 2022. https://ivypanda.com/essays/halloween-1978-a-film-analysis/.

Bibliography

IvyPanda . "“Halloween” (1978): A Film Analysis." November 23, 2022. https://ivypanda.com/essays/halloween-1978-a-film-analysis/.

• About / FAQ
• Submit News
• Upcoming Horror
• Marketing Macabre

Horror News | HNN Official Site | Horror Movies,Trailers, Reviews

How to write an essay about horror movies.

Adrian Halen 06/26/2024 Articles special , Exclusive Articles

Horror movies have long been a popular genre in the film industry, thanks to those pulse-quickening thrill rides featuring heart-stopping moments of terror and suspense. Whether you’re a film student, a horror fan or just someone who has long been curious about the genre’s cultural significance, there’s no better way to hone that hankering for horror than to write an essay about the subject. If you need assistance, services like Academized writing service can help write my paper in a week , offering expert guidance and support in crafting essays on various topics, including horror movies.

1. Understanding the Genre

First, there are (literally) countless subgenres of horror movies, and to write about all of them as if they were basically the same thing would be a terrible read. You need to get a handle on the stereotypes: there are countless readers who might recognise you as a timid young woman when you look a lot more like an authoritative priest in their brain.

• Identify Subgenres: Although it is a diverse category, horror is not a genre unto itself but rather a domain that hosts a surprising amount of variety, with subgenres such as: supernatural horror (eg, The Exorcist); psychological horror (eg, Psycho); slasher horror (eg, Halloween); and more. Within these, different techniques produce different kinds of fear and suspense.
• Lesson (theme/subject): horror films elaborate a lot of Universal Ideas, some of which at the very root of human nature and explain things like fears of the unknown, driving instincts that test our core survival, meddlesome human curiosity and its catastrophic consequences. For instance, even though Jaws is about a fully grown, nearly indestructible shark that goes on rampage, it’s actually primarily about primal fears of nature and all the other things that lie just beyond our field of vision.
• Cultural Importance: Viewing horror films through a cultural lens shows how they reflect and address our cultural anxieties; for example, the zombie movie has been read as a metaphor for social problems, from consumerism (Dawn of the Dead) to pandemic (28 Days Later).

2. Analysing Techniques with Examples

Many films use horror as a setting or backdrop to their story, but a truly effective horror film subverts our expectations by using a range of audiovisual strategies to elicit fear and suspense from the viewer. By analysing films in detail, and understanding how they might create an atmosphere of dread, we can add depth and sophistication to our analysis of horror. For those seeking guidance, utilising the expertise of the best essay service can provide invaluable support in crafting insightful essays that delve into the intricacies of horror cinema.

• Use of Sound: Sound and score are crucial to bis, as are manipulations of sound (such as silence and sudden noises) that leave an audience tense and on edge. See how they use these tactics in A Quiet Place.
• The visual imagery: Whether in cinematography or visual effects – can also be hugely instrumental in generating responses. For example, the utilisation of poor lighting and shadows in The Babadook can lead viewers to feel disconcerted and afraid.
• Characterisation: Character, particularly antagonists, is vital in horror. Explore how iconic evil characters such as Freddy Krueger (A Nightmare on Elm Street) or Leatherface (The Texas Chain Saw Massacre) represent pure misgivings and become long term symbols of terror.

3. Constructing a Strong Thesis Statement

A strong thesis statement represents the heart and soul of your essay, summing up its main argument or interpretation:

Thesis Development: Choose a specific claim about the horror film you’re writing about and state it as a thesis; it should then help to determine the shape your essay will take. For example, ‘Supernatural forces in the film The Conjuring series function as a figurative way of depicting the vulnerability of family bonds to harmful influences from beyond the home.

4. Comparative Analysis

Analysis of horror movies can be improved by better drawing out contrasts between them. It can be quite helpful to write an essay drawing out similarities and differences between two movies, well-presented in a comparative table:

Setting these next to each other allows you to show how different horror directors treat the genre, and also what makes each film emotionally resonant with viewers.

5. Incorporating Critical Perspectives

To establish your essay, introduce what film critics and scholars who have written extensively about horror cinema have stated:

Critical Reviews: Look for reviews of a particular film studied by reliable or credible sources. These may present alternative perspectives, enabling you to see films through different lenses. Disclaimer: All Boris Karloff clips on our website are taken from the DVDs History’s Greatest Villains Boris Karloff and Universal’s Classic Monsters Complete 30-Film Collection, released by Shout! Factory.

Academic Analysis: Read textbook articles or chapters that analyse horror cinema in theoretical terms (psychoanalysis, feminist theory, cultural studies, etc) in order to understand how the movies are intended to communicate more ‘serious’ (or, given one’s acquaintance with other theoretical frameworks, perhaps ‘just as serious’) meanings and affective ‘lessons’.

6. Applying Theoretical Frameworks

To take a step further, try using theoretical tools that shed light on the wider themes present within horror cinema: theology/religion; psychoanalysis; queer theory; feminist theory/psychoanalysis.

• Final Girl Theory: Dubbed by American film scholar Carol J Clover, this theory investigates how films such as Halloween (1978) perpetuate the trope of the ‘final girl’ – often a sole female survivor in slasher films who triumphs over the killer – by reversing genre conventions. These conventions privilege male perspectives as the norm and relegate women to symbolism, as one of the ‘screaming girls’. Discuss how the representation of the final girl subverts or reinforces traditional gender roles.

In writing this essay, you would need to account for themes and techniques that drive the genre, as well as understand the cultural contexts that facilitate its development as a cinematic genre with subgenres of its own. By engaging with those requirements, your essay would utilise the appreciation and analysis of relevant cinematic techniques and develop a focused thesis. You might present a comparative analysis of horror genres, critically engage with a horror trope, or fully address a theoretical perspective on horror.

Related Articles

Interview with Arielle Hope, star of Totem Chaser

FOUND: A New Streaming Platform Shaking Up Indie Horror and Found Footage

The Vermillion Queen: Era of the Kings Kindle Edition Now Available

Scary Tales: Dark Walker RELEASES ON TUBI & More Streaming Services to Come

Mario Cerrito’s Human Hibachi 3: The Last Supper starts production this winter

The Flemington Toy and Collectible SPOOKTACULAR

Leave a reply cancel reply.

Your email address will not be published.

• Essay Editor

Classification Essay Guide

A classification essay is a powerful tool in academic writing, enabling writers to break down broad topics into organized categories for better understanding. This guide will show you how to write a classification essay, from designing a perfect outline to selecting compelling topics. Continue reading to learn how to create a clear, insightful, and engaging classification essay.

What is a Classification Essay? A Brief Overview

A classification essay is a type of academic writing that involves organizing and categorizing subjects, ideas, or objects into distinct groups or categories based on shared characteristics. The primary objective of a classification essay is to break down a broad topic into smaller, more manageable parts, making it easier for readers to understand and analyze the subject matter. This type of essay helps demonstrate a writer's ability to organize information logically and enhances critical thinking by requiring the writer to identify and explain the basis for each category.

Designing the Perfect Outline For Your Classification Essay

An effective classification essay requires a well-structured outline that guides the writing process. A clear outline ensures that the essay remains focused, logical, and cohesive. Here is a guide on how to design the perfect classification essay outline:

Introduction

The introduction of a classification essay should serve as a roadmap for the reader. It should provide a brief overview of the topic, explain the essay's purpose, and present the classification criteria. An engaging introduction sets the tone for the entire essay and captures the reader's interest.

Key elements to include in the introduction:

• Hook: A compelling opening sentence to grab the reader's attention.
• Background Information: A brief context or background of the topic to help the reader understand its relevance.
• Thesis Statement: A clear statement that outlines the main categories and the criteria for classification.

The main text, or the body of the essay, is where the detailed classification takes place. Each paragraph should focus on a specific category, providing a thorough explanation and relevant examples.

Here are some points to include in the main text:

• Topic Sentence: Introduces the category being discussed in the classification paragraph.
• Explanation: A detailed explanation of the category, including its defining characteristics.
• Examples: Relevant examples to illustrate the category and enhance understanding.
• Transition: Smooth transitions between paragraphs to maintain the flow of the essay.

The conclusion of a classification essay should summarize the main points and restate the thesis in light of the information presented. It should provide a sense of closure and leave a lasting impression on the reader.

Your conclusion should be composed of the following:

• Summary of main points: Briefly summarize the categories and their significance.
• Restated thesis: Restate the thesis in a new light based on the discussion in the body paragraphs.
• Final thought: Write a closing statement that provides a final insight or reflection on the topic.

How to Write a Classification Essay: Detailed Plan

Writing a classification essay involves several steps, from choosing a topic to organizing the information and drafting the final text. Here's a detailed plan to guide you through the process:

Choosing a Topic for Classification Writing

Selecting the right topic is crucial for the success of a classification essay. The topic should be broad enough for multiple categories but specific enough to be manageable.

Tips for choosing a topic:

• Interest and knowledge: Choose a topic that you are interested in and have some knowledge about.
• Relevance: Ensure the topic and the essay's purpose are relevant to the audience.
• Availability of information: Consider sufficient information and examples to support your classifications.

Subjects to Write On

When selecting a subject, think about areas that can be easily divided into categories. Here are some examples of potential subjects for a classification essay:

• Types of books: Fiction, non-fiction, biographies, self-help, etc.
• Learning styles: Visual, auditory, kinesthetic, etc.
• Sports: Team sports, individual sports, extreme sports, etc.
• Hobbies: Indoor hobbies, outdoor hobbies, creative hobbies, etc.
• Movies: Genres such as action, comedy, drama, horror, etc.

Building Up the Main Body of the Text: Things to Remember

The main body is where the detailed classification occurs. Each paragraph should focus on one category and provide a clear and thorough explanation.

Things to remember when building up the main body:

• Consistency: Ensure each category is defined using the same criteria.
• Clarity: Be clear and precise in your descriptions and explanations.
• Examples: Use relevant and diverse examples to illustrate each category.
• Balance: Allocate a similar amount of detail and space to each category to maintain balance.
• Transitions: Use transitional phrases to ensure smooth flow between paragraphs.

Classification Essay Topics

Choosing a topic can be challenging, but here are some ideas to get you started:

• Types of Social Media Platforms: Social networking, microblogging, video sharing, etc.
• Genres of Music: Classical, rock, jazz, hip-hop, etc.
• Forms of Government: Democracy, monarchy, authoritarian, etc.
• Types of Cuisine: Italian, Chinese, Mexican, Indian, etc.
• Methods of Transportation: Public transport, private vehicles, cycling, walking, etc.

Summarize What is Written in Your Classification Paper

Summarizing your classification essay involves revisiting the main points and the categories discussed. In your conclusion, highlight the significance of each category and restate the thesis to reinforce the purpose of your classification.

Steps to summarize your classification paper:

• Review Main Points: Review each category briefly, emphasizing the key characteristics and examples.
• Restate Thesis: Rephrase your thesis statement to reflect the discussion in the body paragraphs.
• Provide Closure: End with a final thought or reflection that ties everything together and provides a sense of completeness.

A well-written classification essay organizes information effectively and provides insight and clarity on the subject matter. By following this guide, you can create a coherent and engaging classification essay that is informative and enjoyable to read.

Are you trying to write a classification essay but need some help? Why not give Aithor a try? Whether you're a student or an aspiring writer, this tool can help you know how to write a classification essay, improve the logical organization of your essay, and effectively convey complex information. 

Visit Aithor and see how this amazing tool can change your essay-writing experience.

Related articles

Discussion posts: definition, overview, writing tips.

Discussions are an important part of academic studies. They foster collaboration, raise student engagement, and help to better process new information. A common way to involve students in critical debate is through discussion posts. In this article, you will learn what a discussion post is and how to write it. Discussion post and open forum definition A discussion post is a written reply typically used in online forums – websites that encourage users to engage in a debate over various subject ...

How to Write a Table of Contents for Research Paper: A Complete Guide

After hundreds of hours of non-stop working, the research essay is finished! Unfortunately, it is not the time to celebrate. That’s when you must get down to one of the least pleasant things in professional college or high school writing – a table of contents. The following article will define table of contents, discuss its purpose, and provide guidance on how to make a table of contents for a research paper. What is a research paper table of contents? Academic essays can be from 2–3 to hundr ...

Top Proven Tips on How to Make Homework Fun

Everyone agrees that school would be much cooler if there were no homework. Alas, this is an impossible wish. Luckily, no one stops us from making it fun! In this article, you will find some awesome tips on how to make homework fun. 1. Create a comfortable study space Having a separate place where you can study is very important. Sure, you might think sitting on a couch with a laptop in your lap is as fun as it can get, but in reality, it may hinder your progress. Your brain knows that the co ...

How to Write a History Essay: A Guideline for Non-Historians

History is a difficult discipline, no one can argue with that. It is especially challenging to write a history essay when you have zero historian bone in your body. That’s why today our goal is to teach you how to write a history essay. What is history essay? A historical paper is a classic instance of a scholarly work that seeks to examine and give answers to questions about long-gone factual incidents and their consequences. Unlike a simple narrative or description, a history paper demands ...

Top 10 Excuses for Not Doing Homework: How to Trick Your Teacher in 2024

Whether it’s because you’re buried in other commitments or just had a seriously off day, finding credible excuses for not doing homework can save your day. Here's a brief look at the top 10 homework excuses, with tips on making them sound as true as possible. Just remember, use these wisely and try to stay on top of your assignments! 1. “My computer crashed right before I finished” In today’s digital world, technology problems are a plausible justification. Claiming that your laptop glitched ...

Top 5 Creative Book Report Ideas That Guarantee Success in Class

Assigned reading helps students develop their critical analysis skill, and book reports test their progress. But it is not enough to simply analyze a literary work — you also need to express your creativity while presenting book report ideas. In this article, you will learn the definition of a literary report, its purpose, and five alternative book report ideas to show off your creativity in class. What is a book (literary) report? A book report is an overall summary and personal assessment o ...

Why Homework Is Good for Students: 20 No-Nonsense Reasons

Is homework beneficial in education? It has long been a cornerstone, often sparking debates about its value. Some argue it creates unnecessary stress, while others assert it’s essential for reinforcing in-class learning. Why is homework important? The reality is, that homework is vital for students' personal and academic growth. It not only improves their grasp of the material but also develops crucial skills that extend well beyond the classroom. This review explores 20 reasons why homework is ...

Best Places to Do Homework That Will Create a Perfect Study Heaven for You

Are you wondering, ‘Where can I go to do homework?’ Finding the ideal spot for studying can significantly affect your productivity and overall study experience. Whether you're a student seeking solace or someone looking for a change of scenery, selecting the right environment is key to maximizing your efficiency and focus. In this guide, we’ll discover various places to do homework that can transform your study routine into a more engaging and effective experience. The Importance of Having a C ...

Why We Crave Horror Movies

27 pages • 54 minutes read

A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.

Essay Analysis

Key Figures

Index of Terms

Literary Devices

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Discussion Questions

Analysis: “Why We Crave Horror Movies”

The essay “Why We Crave Horror Movies” interweaves point of view , structure, and tone to address the foundational themes of fear, emotions, and “insanity” in relation to horror movies. It examines why horror films allow the expression of fearful emotions linked to irrationality. The essay integrates literary techniques and pop culture references to form a cohesive whole, and it highlights several key themes: Good Versus Bad Emotions , The Expression of Fear Through Horror Movies , and “Insanity” and Normality in Society and Horror Film .

King argues that fear and other negative emotions are universal and that horror movies are a key art form for expressing these emotions. The essay gives audiences permission to experience and enjoy these films as a vehicle for fears.

Related Titles

By Stephen King

Bag of Bones

Billy Summers

Children of the Corn

Different Seasons

Doctor Sleep

Dolores Claiborne

End of Watch

Finders Keepers

Firestarter

From a Buick 8

Full Dark, No Stars

Gerald's Game

Gwendy's Button Box

Featured Collections

Books About Art

View Collection

Good & Evil

What is Horror? Definition and Examples in Film

W hy are humans drawn to the horror genre? From books to film, we can’t seem to get enough of what scares us most. In this article, we will look at the definition of horror and why we enjoy the genre so much. We will also look at a brief history of American cinema and how horror has evolved over the years. While this article will provide a general definition of horror, the genre is open to interpretation. After all, what is horror to you, is Child’s Play to me.

Watch: What Makes a Great Jump Scare?

Subscribe for more filmmaking videos like this.

Define Horror

The horror genre explained.

Horror is one of the most popular genres in storytelling. What began in literature can now be found in movies, television, theatre, and video games. The horror genre has been divided into many sub-genres with their own definitions and criteria. Before we get to those, let's define horror at a basic level:

HORROR DEFINITION

What is horror.

Horror is a genre of storytelling intended to scare, shock, and thrill its audience. Horror can be interpreted in many different ways, but there is often a central villain, monster, or threat that is often a reflection of the fears being experienced by society at the time. This person or creature is called the “other,” a term that refers to someone that is feared because they are different or misunderstood. This is also why the horror genre has changed so much over the years. As culture and fears change, so does horror.

What are some defining elements of the horror genre?

• Themes : The horror genre is often a reflection of the culture and what it fears at the time (invasion, disease, nuclear testing, etc.). 
• Character Types : Besides the killer, monster, or threat, the various sub-genres contain certain hero archetypes (e.g., the Final Girl in Slasher movies).
• Setting : Horror can have many settings, such as: a gothic castle, small town, outer space, or haunted house. It can take place in the past, present or future.
• Music : This is an important facet in the horror genre. It can be used with great effect to build atmosphere and suspense.

Horror Subgenres

Different types of horror movies.

The horror genre has given birth to many sub-genres and hybrids of these various types. Each has its own unique themes, but all of them share one common goal: FEAR.

Found Footage

The point-of-view takes place from the perspective of a camera. Famous titles include  The Blair Witch Project  and  Rec .  

Lovecraftian

Focuses on cosmic horror. Monsters are beings beyond our comprehension. Often incorporates science fiction, including horror classics like  Alien  and  The Thing . 

Psychological

This sub-genre focuses on the horror of the mind. What is real? What is madness? Two great psychological horror movies are  Silence of the Lambs  and  Jacob’s Ladder . 

Science Fiction

Focuses on the horror and consequences of technology. Monsters are often aliens or machines. Two great sci-fi horror movies are  The Blob   and  War of the Worlds .

The monster is a psychopath with a penchant for bloody murder. Often focuses on the punishment of promiscuous teenagers. Popular movies include  Halloween  and  A Nightmare on Elm Street .

Supernatural

Focuses on the afterlife. Primary creatures include ghosts and demons. Great titles include  Poltergeist   and  The Exorcist .

Similar to slasher; focuses on the punishment of people. The villain takes pleasure in the physical and psychological torment of victims. Famous movies include  Hostel  and  Saw . 

One of the oldest horror sub-genres in which icons like Dracula feed on human blood. Some of the best vampire movies include  Nosferatu and Interview with the Vampire . 

When a full moon is out, beware of these beastly shape-shifters. The best werewolf movies include  An American Werewolf in London  and  The Wolf Man . 

A group of survivors is usually attacked by a horde of flesh-eating undead.  Night of the Living Dead  is considered one of the best zombie movies along with  28 Days Later... and Shaun of the Dead .

A History of Horror Movies 1896-2018

Horror vs thriller, the relationship of horror and thriller.

While the two genres are often confused, there is a clear difference between horror and thriller movies. Horror movie rules demand violence and a monster that appears early and relatively frequently. The climax revolves around a final fight or an escape from the monster. The "monster" in horror is typically "unnatural" or even "supernatural," whereas thrillers tend to rely on human threats.

In a thriller, there is much more mystery and discovery. Tensions rise as the protagonist gets closer to discovering the evil threat. The climax revolves around a big reveal, such as the true intentions of the villain.

The two genres con blend, of course, such as the modern horror/thriller Get Out (2017). Something like  Halloween  might also be considered a crossover since the killer is human but he exhibits supernatural abilities — like how he never seems to die when he's "killed."

Now that we've covered our horror film definition, let's take a look back at a history of horror movies. Through the decades, the horror movie has evolved to reflect what we we fear the most, as explained in this video.

The Horror Genre and Cultural Fears

1930’s horror, horror and the depression.

The 1930s was a tough period for America. We were in the midst of the Great Depression and Americans were feeling more desperate than ever before.  Despite the economic turmoil, people spent what little they had on entertainment, like movies. One of the first great American horror films that garnered much popularity was Dracula (1931), based on the novel by Bram Stoker. And it set the standard for the  Best Vampire Movies thereafter.

But why was Dracula so terrifying? Americans were afraid of European influence. World War I ended only 13 years prior. The American mindset was still heavily influenced by the atrocities that took place. Combined with the influx of European immigrants, people were afraid of outsiders corrupting American culture. Someone had to be the scapegoat.

Another film that was a reflection of the fears of the time was  Frankenstein (1931), based on the novel by Mary Shelly. This movie created a more sympathetic monster; one that was fleeing from the oppression of his creator.

Below is the original disclaimer that ran before the movie began. It is a warning played up for dramatic effect ("...it might even horrify you!"). 

Frankenstein Disclaimer

Americans felt as though they that their government had failed them.  They blamed their leaders for their misfortune, much like how Dr. Frankenstein failed to protect his creation.

A recurring theme in horror is that the monster is often mankind itself. The villagers lashed out against something they didn’t understand, becoming monsters themselves.

What is Horror? Dracula (1931)

1950s horror, horror in the '50s.

World War II ended in 1945, but it left a huge mark on the world, both literally and figuratively. The use of nuclear weapons on Hiroshima and Nagasaki gave way to a new era of fear in the nuclear age. The consequences of mankind’s use of science and technology would become a common theme.

Often not thought of as horror, Godzilla (1954) is a Japanese film that came to America. It was a response to the bombs used by the U.S. In this story, an animal is transformed by nuclear radiation into a giant monster and terrorizes the country. With the advent of the nuclear age, many questions and fears were brought up with this powerful but dangerous energy source.

The monster movie has a rich tradition within the horror genre, dating back to the very first movies. Do yourself a favor and watch this documentary on the history of the monster movie.

History of the Horror Genre  •  Monster Movies

The 50’s also gave to the Red Scare and the fear of communism. The theme of invasion became prevalent in many monster movies. Science fiction would blend with the horror genre, giving birth to films such as   War of the Worlds (1953) and Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956).

In the first film, aliens begin an invasion of earth in a small town, indicative of a communist attack. In the second film, humans are replaced with alien duplicates, which represents the fear of communism overtaking democracy.

What is Horror? War of the Worlds (1953)

1960s-'70s horror, when the monster became human.

The 1960s-'70s was a period of uncertainty and violence for America. We were in the midst of the Vietnam War, a conflict that caused much controversy. For the first time, the U.S. was no longer in the right for a global conflict. The violence committed by men led to the fear of what we as a species were capable of.

Night of the Living Dead (1968) came as a result of this fear and uncertainty. The monsters, which looked very human, would mercilessly attack, kill and devour people. What made the zombies most terrifying was that they could take on the appearance of our loved ones. If we cannot trust our fellow human, who can we trust?

Thanks to a copyright error,  Night of the Living Dead belongs in the public domain. That means you can watch it for free right now. Any self-respecting horror genre fan has to watch this movie.

Watch Night of the Living Dead in its entirety

The 70’s were also known for the increase in news coverage on serial killer murders. Media outlets reported on these maniacs as if they were celebrities. People were afraid of the monster next door coming by and killing them in their homes.

This gave rise to the first “slasher,” Halloween (1978). Despite appearing human, Michael Myers was  an unstoppable killer that stalked his victims with murderous intent. Slashers grew immensely in popularity, even affecting movies that are not slashers .

The slasher sub-genre would also explore the subject of morality. The sexually promiscuous would be punished and violently murdered, while the moral “Final Girl” would survive to the bitter end.

One would think that these human monsters would drive people away from horror. But the blood-soaked films would make the genre more popular than ever.

What is Horror? Halloween (1976)

1980s-'90s horror, what is self-aware horror.

Coming out of the serial killer era in the '70s, the '80s would continue the trend of slashers with a massive influx of these movies. Friday the 13th ,   A Nightmare on Elm Street   and even Halloween would spawn numerous sequels, each one more absurd than the last.

Hitting a breaking point, the horror genre became more "aware" of itself in the form of Scream (1996). Though very much still a slasher, this film acknowledged the well-worn tropes established by its predecessors, such as the Final Girl.

What is Horror? Scream (1996)

Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997-2003) would take the trope of the weak high school girl and turn her into a monster killer. While the protagonist, Buffy, was killing vampires and other monsters, she and her friends would still experience the woes of being a teenager.

The '90s would also pave the way for a new sub-genre: found footage. The Blair Witch Project   (1999) gave the audience the point-of-view of a camera, putting them in the shoes of the victims. This made the horror more personal for viewers, revitalizing the genre as a whole.

Horror Sub-genres  •  Found Footage

2000s horror, when the horror film took a dark turn.

After 9/11, the war on terror would spawn a generation of films that would redefine what horror is: torture. The prospect of psychos capturing and torturing their victims, both physically and psychologically proved to be a box office success.

Perhaps the most notorious of these is Saw (2004). In this film, a sociopath captures several people and forces them to play his sadistic games if they want to survive. This gruesome concept would spawn a plethora of sequels and copycats, flooding the market and coining a new term for the excess of violence: torture porn.

Global fears and international terror attacks made the end of the world seem more plausible. People became more fascinated than ever over the prospect of a catastrophe like a zombie apocalypse.

As such, the horror genre would reflect this with shows such as The Walking Dead (2010-present). How would any of us survive? How can something so overwhelming ever be stopped? As zombie movies grew in popularity, so did the number of movies. And as this video explains, what we now call "zombies" began as something quite different.

Horror Sub-genres  •  Zombies

The future of horror, what is horror today.

To say we live in a new world would be an understatement. The COVID-19 pandemic has changed the way we act, think and feel. Global culture as a whole has changed and it will continue to do so for some time. As such, expect the horror genre to reflect this evolution of fear. Don’t be surprised when an influx of movies revolving around isolation and global pandemics hits theaters.

There has been a sort of renaissance of horror movies in the last decade that has been quite excited to watch. Films like The Witch , It Follows and Hereditary have been dubbed "elevated horror" — a divisive term to say the least. Whatever we call them, they are all still really strong and effective horror movies. Here's a breakdown of Midsommar and how the shape of the horror genre continues to evolve.

How Ari Aster Uses the Background  •   Subscribe on YouTube

The best horror movies of all time.

We just covered a very broad horror genre definition and there is a lot more to explore. We've been talking a lot about the horror genre but now it's time to face our fears and actually watch some. Through the last century, across genre to sub-genre, from ghouls to goblins, here are the Best Horror Movies of All Time.

Up Next: Best Horror Movies →

Showcase your vision with elegant shot lists and storyboards..

Create robust and customizable shot lists. Upload images to make storyboards and slideshows.

Learn More ➜

• Pricing & Plans
• Product Updates
• Featured On
• StudioBinder Partners
• Ultimate Guide to Call Sheets
• How to Break Down a Script (with FREE Script Breakdown Sheet)
• The Only Shot List Template You Need — with Free Download
• Managing Your Film Budget Cashflow & PO Log (Free Template)
• A Better Film Crew List Template Booking Sheet
• Best Storyboard Softwares (with free Storyboard Templates)
• Movie Magic Scheduling
• Gorilla Software
• Storyboard That

A visual medium requires visual methods. Master the art of visual storytelling with our FREE video series on directing and filmmaking techniques.

We’re in a golden age of TV writing and development. More and more people are flocking to the small screen to find daily entertainment. So how can you break put from the pack and get your idea onto the small screen? We’re here to help.

• Making It: From Pre-Production to Screen
• What is a Femme Fatale — Definition, Characteristics, Examples
• What is Method Acting — 3 Different Types Explained
• How to Make a Mood Board — A Step-by-Step Guide
• What is a Mood Board — Definition, Examples & How They Work
• How to Make a Better Shooting Schedule with a Stripboard
• 69 Facebook
• 11 Pinterest

REVIEW article

(why) do you like scary movies a review of the empirical research on psychological responses to horror films.

• Faculty of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences, School of Psychotherapy and Psychology, Regent’s University London, London, United Kingdom

Why do we watch and like horror films? Despite a century of horror film making and entertainment, little research has examined the human motivation to watch fictional horror and how horror film influences individuals’ behavioral, cognitive, and emotional responses. This review provides the first synthesis of the empirical literature on the psychology of horror film using multi-disciplinary research from psychology, psychotherapy, communication studies, development studies, clinical psychology, and media studies. The paper considers the motivations for people’s decision to watch horror, why people enjoy horror, how individual differences influence responses to, and preference for, horror film, how exposure to horror film changes behavior, how horror film is designed to achieve its effects, why we fear and why we fear specific classes of stimuli, and how liking for horror develops during childhood and adolescence. The literature suggests that (1) low empathy and fearfulness are associated with more enjoyment and desire to watch horror film but that specific dimensions of empathy are better predictors of people’s responses than are others; (2) there is a positive relationship between sensation-seeking and horror enjoyment/preference, but this relationship is not consistent; (3) men and boys prefer to watch, enjoy, and seek our horror more than do women and girls; (4) women are more prone to disgust sensitivity or anxiety than are men, and this may mediate the sex difference in the enjoyment of horror; (5) younger children are afraid of symbolic stimuli, whereas older children become afraid of concrete or realistic stimuli; and (6) in terms of coping with horror, physical coping strategies are more successful in younger children; priming with information about the feared object reduces fear and increases children’s enjoyment of frightening television and film. A number of limitations in the literature is identified, including the multifarious range of horror stimuli used in studies, disparities in methods, small sample sizes, and a lack of research on cross-cultural differences and similarities. Ideas for future research are explored.

Horror: An Introduction

“It seems an unaccountable pleasure which the spectators of a well-written tragedy receive from sorrow, terror, anxiety and other passions, that are in themselves disagreeable and uneasy” ( Hume, 1907 ).

Why do people watch, and enjoy watching, horror films, and why is this an important or useful question to ask? The primary aims of the horror film are to frighten, shock, horrify, and disgust using a variety of visual and auditory leitmotifs and devices including reference to the supernatural, the abnormal, to mutilation, blood, gore, the infliction of pain, death, deformity, putrefaction, darkness, invasion, mutation, extreme instability, and the unknown ( Cherry, 2009 ; Newman, 2011 ). It is the emphasis on these characteristics that tend to distinguish horror from the related genre of thriller or psychological thriller ( Hanich, 2011 ). Thrillers are designed to create suspense and terror, but the creation of these feelings is dependent not on the presence of mutilation, gore, or the supernatural but via more human devices. These boundaries, however, can be fuzzy. If these features are utilized in thrillers, they are not the principal focus of the film but are incidental to it (an example would be the ear-cutting scene in Reservoir Dogs, which is bloody and brutal but is contained within a film, which has a non-horror theme). Together with Westerns, science fiction, comedy, musicals, documentaries, and other film genres, which are characterized by particular tropes, styles, themes, characters, and visual leitmotifs, horror sets itself apart from other film types via its distinctive characteristics.

Although commercially successful, the cinematic reputation of horror film has been less than stellar. It has been frequently regarded (if it is regarded at all) as the runt of the cinema family and held in lower esteem than other film categories ( Stone, 2016 ). Etchison (2011) observed that “The horror film occupies in popular culture roughly comparable to that of horror literature. That is to say, it is generally ignored, sometimes acknowledged with bemused tolerance, and viewed with alarm when it irritates authority - rather like a child too spirited to follow the rules that rendition has deemed acceptable” (p. ix), a view that is echoed elsewhere. For example, Tudor (1997) noted that “a taste of horror is a taste for something seemingly abnormal and is therefore deemed to require special attention” (p. 446). Part of the reason for the disdain, apart from the broad and base nature of the content, may be the relative cheapness of horror film: these are often much less expensive to create than are other genre films such as westerns, comedies, or science fiction. The first horror film can probably be dated to 1855/1856. The Lumiere Brothers’ L’arrive d’un train en gare de la Ciotat depicts the arrival of a train into a station, the appearance of which, if anecdotal although possibly apocryphal accounts are to be believed, resulted in the audience becoming consumed with a fear that the train would emerge from the screen, such was the novelty of such a depiction at the time.

In terms of industry regard, the reputation of horror has not been high. The American Academy of Motion Picture Arts, which awards the Oscars, has nominated only six horror/supernatural films for Best Picture, and only one has won the Award ( The Silence of The Lambs in 1992, which also won the award for Best Actress, Actor, and Director). Other horror films to have been nominated include The Exorcist (1973), Jaws (1975), The 6th Sense (1999), Black Swan (2010), and Get Out (2017). The latter also nominated for best comedy/musical at the Golden Globes and was winner of the Oscar for Best Screenplay. Industry recognition for horror film has tended to be reserved for technical achievements; hence, the Oscars awarded for best art direction and cinematography for Phantom Of The Opera (1943), best score for The Omen (1976), best visual effects for Alien (1979), and best-make up for An American Werewolf In London (1981) and The Fly (1986). The number of actors to have won an Oscar nomination for horror roles is low – Frederic March ( Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde , 1931), Ruth Gordon ( Rosemary’s Baby, 1968), Kathy Bates ( Misery , 1990), Natalie Portman ( Black Swan , 2010), and Hopkins are exceptions.

Despite the relative lack of formal industry recognition and professional respect, horror thrives. In 2017, the second cinema adaptation of the Stephen King novel IT (2017) generated $700.4 m in global ticket sales, making this the most financially successful horror film of all time based on recorded box office sales (its production budget was $35 m). The success led to a sequel released in 2019 ( IT: Chapter 2 ), which has achieved global ticket sales of $185 m in its first week of release. In 1989, two horror films had grossed over $38 m ( The Fly II and The Abyss , earning $38.9 and $89.8 m, respectively). In 2017, this number was 15, with IT leading and occupying 13th place in box office revenue. The Mummy occupied 23rd position, Resident Evil: Final Chapter the 30th position, Annabelle: Creation the 32rd, and Get Out the 37th ($255 m). Nine horror films earned more than $100 m in 2017. These numbers illustrate how successful and popular the horror film has become and that viewers’ appetite for it is rapacious.

This commercial enthusiasm exists against a backdrop of considerable fan enthusiasm for the genre, as evidenced by the number of major, significant genre-specific international film festivals which exist. These include the UK’s three Frightfest events, the Sitges International Fantastic Film Festival in Catalonia, Toronto’s After Dark Film Festival, Screamfest and Fantasticfest in the USA, the Brussels International Fantastic Film Festival, Australia’s A Night of Horror International Film Festival, Amsterdam’s Imagine Festival, Argentina’s Rojo Sangre, Italy’s Ravena Nightmare Film Festival, Wales’s Abertoir, and several others. A number of print magazines devoted to horror is available (such as Rue Morgue, Diabolique, Scream , and The Dark Side ) as are various horror websites, online film streaming services (such as Shudder and Screambox ), and specialist satellite/Freeview TV channels such as The Horror Channel and SyFy . The TV company AMC airs and produces original horror content (and created Shudder ), and an Asian-based pay-TV horror channel is available called Thrill . Given the popularity of horror film, a useful question to explore is why people are attracted to this genre of film, given its distinctive nature, and why people are attracted to horror in the first instance, a question addressed in this review.

Historically, horror has formed a significant part of “Western” literary tradition since the Babylonian Gilgamesh and the English Beowulf . The Gothic tradition, a period that covers 1,760–1,820 features fiction in which the omphalos is their archaic themes, haunted castles, stylized period settings, a supernatural element in the story telling, suspense, and chaos ( Punter, 2014 ). Examples include Walpole’s The Castle of Otranto , Radcliffe’s Mysteries of Udolpho, and The Italian and Lewis’ The Monk, among others. Although modern horror clearly has its roots and traditions in Gothic horror (and castles, spirits, and ghosts are well-documented tropes of horror films), very little modern horror film has been directly inspired by, nor has adapted, these works. Victorian literature has exerted a much greater and direct influence, as evidenced by the re-imaginings and remakes of films based on literary characters from this period, such as Dracula, Frankenstein (doctor and creation), Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, the Hunchback of Notre Dame, the Phantom of the Opera, Dr. Moreau, Dorian Gray, the monsters and protagonists in Grimm’s Fairy Tales, and the trolls of Nordic literature. These figures have been interpreted and re-interpreted throughout the twentieth and twenty-first centuries in different fictionalized forms – in theater, drama, radio, television, short stories, novels, and, especially, film.

Given the longevity of horror as a genre and its history in cinema, what is it that draws people to this particular genre and how does the genre create the psychological effects that it does? The study of individuals’ response to horror can be illuminating for several reasons. It may help us understand why people are attracted to a very commercially successful genre of film making but one which is seen as very distinctive and highly specialized. It may also help us to explain why some material that is perceived as being unpleasant and disgusting is appealing to some people more than it is to others. The study of horror film may also help us understand how emotions are generated and processed and may help us understand elements of fear (and the attraction of fear).

The current paper sets out to review the literature regarding the appeal of horror and why and how horror cinema exerts the effects that it does. Specifically, it will consider whether there are personality types or other individual differences associated with preference for, and enjoyment of, horror films; whether sex differences exist in the preference for, and enjoyment of, horror film; how fear of horror film develops and how coping strategies are recruited to manage the fear elicited by horror; the psychological and emotional consequences of watching horror and whether watching horror is associated with any adverse, short-term, or long-term psychological consequences; the behavioral responses reliably elicited by exposure to horror film; and the use of auditory stimulation to manipulate our response to horror. A number of texts exists that have discussed and addressed various aspects of horror and horror film, including the cinematic portrayal of the “mad scientist” ( Tudor, 1989 ; Frayling, 2013 ), the esthetics of horror film ( Sipos, 2010 ), the philosophy of horror ( Carroll, 2003 ), the process of horror fiction writing ( King, 2010 ), the use of sound and music in horror ( Hayward, 2009 ), and the marketing of horror films ( Hantke, 2004 ), among others. To the author’s knowledge, this is the first attempt to assimilate the psychology and related literature in a comprehensive review of our understanding of the enjoyment of horror film, the motivation to watch horror film and the effects of watching horror film. This review was based on keyword searches made via Google Scholar and PsycInfo between 2018 and August 2019 and included combinations of the words and terms “horror,” “terror,” “film,” “movie,” “cinema,” “fear,” “thriller,” “slasher,” “fright,” “gore,” “anxiety,” “the unknown,” “the uncanny,” “Gothic,” “blood,” “guts,” “scream/screaming,” “shudder,” shivering,” “trauma,” and “disgust/disgusting.” Material was also sourced from the reference sections of the papers obtained and of books where the topic was horror. The review begins with a definition of horror.

What is “Horror”?

The word “horror” derives from the Greek phryke (meaning “shudder”) and describes the physical manifestations of shivering, shuddering, and piloerection. In the fourth stasimon of Sophocles’ Oedipus Tyrannus , the chorus says after the protagonist blinds himself: “Alas, poor man, I cannot ever look at you … such is the shiver (phryke) you cause in me” ( Cairns, 2015 ). An exact and precise modern definition of horror, however, is difficult to determine. Horror has been defined as a “spontaneous response to shocking visual stimulus” (Ceirus, 2015) and as “a compound of terror and revulsion” ( Kawin, 2012 ). In Kawin’s interpretation, “imagined horror provides entry to the made-up world where fears are heightened but can be mastered … it accesses a core of fears we may share as humans, such as the fear of being attacked in the dark … it provides a way to conceptualize, give shape to and deal with the evil and frightening.” Horror, Stone (2016) argues, “confronts us with the disgusting and the fascinating simultaneously,” two aspects of horror returned to later. Horror, according to Marriott (2012) , is “the madwoman in the attic.”

One view of horror considers it to be of two types: horror, which is genuine and is designed to make us afraid because it is advantageous to our survival (e.g., fear arising from attack and being motivated to fight or flee), and “art horror,” which describes the imagined horror found in horror films ( Carroll, 1987 ). Carroll also argues that “horror novels, stories, films, plays and so on are marked by the presence of monsters of either a supernatural or sci-fi origin” (p. 52). In Carroll’s definition, it is the presence of a monster, which defines the essence of a horror film, as monsters do not exist within our conventional realm of understanding or reason; they defy science; they should not exist. Carroll views films that are typically classed as horror (e.g., Psycho ) to be of a different type (tales of terror) because “though eerie and scary, [they] achieve their hair-raising effect by explaining extreme psychological phenomena that are all too human.” This definition, of course, would exclude a significant number of obviously horrific horror films such as The Silence of the Lambs , Henry – Portrait of A Serial Killer , the Saw and Hostel franchises and other exemplars of the “torture porn” horror sub-genre and the cannibal films of the 1970s (e.g., Cannibal Holocaust and Cannibal Ferox ). The view has also been challenged ( Gaut, 1993 ). “Slasher” movies, for example, are clearly horror films but do not necessarily contain monsters as described by Carroll (although some, such as Freddie Kruger, Jason Voorhees, and Michael Myers, possess supernatural elements, and Freddie Kruger is an oneiric fiction). Also, Chewbacca and The Force defy the conventions of science, but Star Wars would not be classed a horror film.

Horror invariably includes an element of evil, channeled via a human, a creature, or a supernatural force, which has the power to change events causing disruption and instability and which must be challenged and defeated ( Kjeldgaard-Christiansen, 2016 ). If this force is not human or supernatural (ghostly, spectral), it is natural – plants, monkeys, ants, leeches, sharks, birds, dogs, bats, rats, bees, fish, earthworms, alligators, spiders, snakes, cockroaches, and dinosaurs have all been employed to create chaos and instability in horror films. Freud (1919/2003) referred to horror as the uncanny (a peculiar translation of “unheimlich, meaning “unhomely”): “the name for everything that ought to have remained secret and hidden but has come to light.” Horror films also invariably present a Manichean view of the world, where good battles evil (as is literally the case in films such as Dracula, The Exorcist, and The Omen ). There is a driving motivation to overcome “a pure and unmotivated desire to inflict suffering” ( Clasen, 2014 ). But horror film, despite the features that the genre shares, is not a unitary cinematic phenomenon and distinct sub-genres or branches exist which are characterized by similar features or styles of film making and storytelling. Often, these are post hoc classifications of films, which seem to share core features, and the classification can seem like an exercise in pattern recognition. There are films, which do not easily lend themselves to these classifications (and some may straddle boundaries). However, the most common and typical sub genres include gothic, supernatural/occult/parananormal, psychological horror, monster movies, slasher films, body horror/horror typified by extreme gore, exploitation cinema ( Cherry, 2009 ), and found-footage, which have a very specific technical film-making approach and its own identifiable tropes bequeathed from such films as Cannibal Holocaust (1980) but more demonstrably from The Blair Witch Project (1999).

Horror film is the only fictional genre, which is specifically created to elicit fear consistently and deliberately rather than sporadically or incidentally. Behaviorally, horror film can create shivering, closing of the eyes, startle, shielding of the eyes, trembling, paralysis, piloerection, withdrawal, heaving, and screaming ( Harris et al., 2000 ). It can produce changes in psychophysiology, specifically increasing heart rate and galvanic skin response (see below). Mentally, it can create anxiety, fear, empathy, and thoughts of disgust ( Cantor, 2004 ). One of the earliest empirical studies to examine the effect of watching horror or suspenseful cinema on behavior asked participants to watch three programs, which varied in suspense (high and low) and in outcome – where the film had a resolved ending or an unresolved ending ( Zillmann et al., 1975 ). The suspenseful programs with the resolved endings were better appreciated than were those with unresolved endings. However, similar – but smaller – results were also found for the unresolved endings (i.e., appreciation levels were high if the program was suspenseful). Cantor (2004) asked students to write about their experiences of horror films and analyzed 3 years’ worth of the students’ papers (530 in total). Approximately 46% of the sample reported experiencing sleep disturbances after the event and 75% reported having experienced anxiety. The four most frequently cited causes of frightening experiences were the films, Poltergeist (5.5%), Jaws (4.3%), Blair Witch Project (4.2%), and Scream (3.2%). There were some film-specific anxieties – respondents would express fear of swimming in lakes and oceans, uneasiness around clowns and televisions, and avoidance of camping and woods.

Behavioral change has also been examined experimentally. Hagenaars et al. (2014) , for example, asked 50 participants to watch neutral, pleasant, or unpleasant film clips while “standing on a stabilometric platform.” This device measures a person’s motoric behavior as participants engage in some exercise or task. They found that when participants watched unpleasant films, the participants would freeze, show reduced body sway, and heart rate deceleration. The reduced body sway was found early on in the viewing of the unpleasant material (1–2 s after stimulus onset) suggesting that the behavioral effects of watching horror are immediate. The study is one of the few, methodologically well-controlled studies of behavioral response to films designed to elicit strong emotions (pleasant or unpleasant) and demonstrated empirically how exposure to certain types of film affects physical behavior and, in this specific example, how certain types of film inhibit motor behavior.

People’s enjoyment of horror can also be affected by priming. Cantor et al. (1984) found that providing adults with information about the types of events they were about to see in four horror films increased the degree of fright and upset that the participants experienced. Neuendorf and Sparks (1988) extended Cantor et al.’s study by presenting 121 attendees of two horror films ( The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Night of the Living Dead ) at a US cinema with three levels of warning – the low warning involved the transmission of basic information such as the film’s name, the release date, and its R rating; the moderate warning involved all of the low information plus a description of the film’s content; the high warning included both of these plus a statement about a graphic scene in the film (e.g., a paraplegic being sawn in half by a saw-wielding maniac). If individuals reported being previously afraid of the specific types of content mentioned by the experimenters, these “cues” significantly predicted overall fear when prior experience of the film and anxiety was controlled for (fear was measured via questionnaire rather than behaviorally). There was no significant correlation between a trait known as sensation seeking (see below) and liking and enjoyment of either film. There was a correlation between prior experience and enjoyment for The Texas Chainsaw Massacre suggesting that viewers repeated their viewing because they enjoyed it the first time. Viewers’ anxiety level predicted the fright generated by Night of the Living Dead , as did fear cues. The greater the experienced anxiety and the fear cues, the greater the experienced fright. The availability of spoilers – the reveal of key scenes and plot points in a work of fiction in advance of viewing – appears to have little effect on the positive enjoyment of horror film or the experience of suspense ( Johnson et al., 2019 ).

Our behavioral reaction to horror tends to be consistent, although there is not much research that has explicitly investigated this response. The next section considers some of the reasons why people watch horror film and considers some of the dominant theories and models in interdisciplinary research that have been proposed to explain our enjoyment of horror film. It considers first some of the most salient ways in which horror film sets out to frighten viewers including sound.

Sound in Horror

In addition to the visual and verbal (dialogue) impact of horror, perhaps one of the most significant elements of horror film is auditory. To this end, some authors have argued that “horror is primarily a sound-based medium” ( Kawin, 2012 ): The creaking door, the scream, the shriek of an owl, the hiss of a cat, the squelching of a head as it meets a sledgehammer, the ringing of a phone, the bang of a falling object, and the crack of a branch in an otherwise quiet forest at night are all auditory devices deigned to make viewers and listeners afraid and to create suspense.

One of the most successful, and the most common, auditory tropes in horror is the use of a loud sound after a prolonged period of silence – the so-called “jump scare.” Often the sound is unconnected with what is on screen, but a loud noise might accompany a reveal, such as a face (an example from the genre would be a character opening a mirrored bathroom cupboard door, then closing to discover the reflection of another person standing behind them, with accompanying loud noise or musical note). A distinction is sometimes made between diegetic sound (which the characters can hear) and non-diegetic sounds (which is external to the characters, such as incidental music). Famous examples of the latter are the stabbing and screeching sound of Bernard Herrmann’s violins during the shower scene in Psycho, John Williams’s double bass that precedes the appearance of the shark in Jaws, John Carpenter’s “stings” and soundtrack in Halloween, and the foreboding chorus in The Omen. Carpenter has noted that when his film was screened without a soundtrack to a film executive “she wasn’t scared at all. I then became determined to ‘save it with music’” ( Hayward, 2009 ). The high strings and low bass of Psycho were influences on Carpenter and Dan Wyman’s score and its 4/5 signature leitmotif, as was the use of Mike Oldfield’s Tubular Bells from the opening of The Exorcist.

Some examples of diegetic sounds in horror film include the bangs and creaks caused by entities that are invisible to the actors on screen; one horror film that relies less on gore and blood and more on the potency of audition to increase suspense is The Blair Witch Project with its use of nocturnal wails, screams, and creaking branches. The use of sound to amplify horror can be identified in many early horror films – Ruben Mamoulian’s Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1931), for example, which includes the first use of the sound of a human heartbeat in film, is familiar for the creation of the “Mamoulian sound stew” of noise, and sound used to generate suspense and excitement in the film.

The second most common auditory influence in horror cinema is the use of music and soundtrack. Research suggests that different styles of music can affect the emotional perception of what is seen in film, regardless of the content ( Bullerjahn and Guldenring, 1994 ), and this accompaniment allows us to interpret what we see in the context of this music ( Gorbman, 1987 ). In horror film, music even has its own trope or leitmotif – the tritone or diabolus in musica (“the devil in music”) otherwise known as the Devil’s tritone ( Lerner, 2010 ) and can be heard in Beetlejuice, Hocus Pocus (1993), and The ‘Burbs (1989).

Some types of music are designed to be unpleasant, be perceived negatively, and to create tension, and there are many examples of this design in horror film, as discussed earlier. Discordant music has been associated with activity in different brain regions to those found when listening to harmonic or pleasant music; these regions include the right parahippocampal gyrus and precuneus and bilateral orbitofrontal cortex ( Blood et al., 1999 ) and may suggest that these regions are involved in mediating our auditory response to some aspects of horror film. Frightening music has been associated with changes in monoamine receptor activity in the caudate nucleus and right amygdala (decreases) and in the neocortex (increases) in 10 men ( Zhang et al., 2012 ). This study did not include a comparison film clip, however, so the conclusion that can be drawn from it is limited.

The most well-used auditory (and visual) device in horror film is the startle reflex (SR), and this tends to be provoked by the jump scare referred to earlier – the sound of a bump, a sudden burst of noise, some dialogue, or music ( Baird, 2000 ). The first known example of a startle effect in horror film is seen and heard in The Cat People (1942) when the sound of a bus door opening occurs just when the viewer is expecting an attack, but the film cuts to this noise and the shot of the door opening. A more recent example can be found in Fatal Attraction where a child’s scream and the whistling of the kettle in the reveal of the boiled rabbit overlap. In the same film, Glenn Close’s character’s resurrection in the bath provides another example of the jump scare that employs an auditory device.

Under laboratory conditions, a startle reflex (SR) is produced by delivering 50 ms of 95 db of white noise at unpredictable intervals, while eyeblink is measured. The stimulation is not always auditory and can be visual or tactile. The acoustic startle reflex describes an in involuntary eyeblink, measured at the orbicularis oculi muscle via EMG, in response to this noise. The startle reflex can be potentiated when individuals anticipate danger ( Grillon et al., 1993a , b ; Bublatzky et al., 2013 ; Bradley et al., 2018 ) and when pleasant stimuli signal threat ( via conditioning) ( Bradley et al., 2005 ). This is called affective modulation of the startle reflex, and the startle potentiation is thought to reflect a person’s emotional reactivity to threat. When people watch fear-related or violent films, the blink magnitude (SR) is larger than when people watch films with sexual content ( Jansen and Frijda, 1994 ), neutral content ( Koukounas and McCabe, 2001 ), or sad content ( Kreibig et al., 2011 ). The startle reflex is also greater when people watch unpleasant slides – and smallest when people watch pleasant slides ( Vrana et al., 1988 ) – and when people listen to unpleasant music ( Roy et al., 2009 ). Roy et al.’s study, however, includes a very small sample of 16 participants.

The SR is higher when people recall fear-related sentences than when recalling neutral sentences ( Vrana and Lang, 1990 ) and is higher when people are exposed to negative stimuli than positive or neutral stimuli ( Cook et al., 1991 ), and this is referred to fear-potentiated startle ( Grillon et al., 1993a , b ). Women’s SR tends to be higher than men’s when stimuli are disgusting ( Yartz and Hawk, 2002 ). Fear, however, is the stimulus that creates the greatest SR ( Bradley et al., 1999 ) and people with specific phobias show potentiated SR when phobia-related stimuli are viewed. Some studies find that a SR does not occur to some types of negative stimuli such as mutilation or surgery ( Stanley and Knight, 2004 ). The startle effect is a highly replicable behavioral phenomenon and can be reduced with the administration on anxiolytics and when lesions are made to the amygdala ( Hitchcock and Davis, 1986 ; Angrilli et al., 1996 ; Davis, 2006 ). It would be instructive to study whether those high and low in empathy or sensation seeking (see below) and whether individuals who like horror film and those who dislike horror film would generate different SRs.

Why do People Watch Horror?

Suspense and resolution of suspense are two important components of horror and our response to horror film. Suspense refers to the build up to threat, the tension created prior to the manifestation of threat, and the resolution/elimination of threat. It has been defined as “acute, fearful apprehension about deplorable events that threatens liked protagonists” and “an experience of uncertainty whose hedonic properties can vary from noxious to pleasant” ( Zillmann, 1996 , p. 108). The tension created during the feeling of suspense can arise from events, which signify conflict, dissonance, and instability ( Lehne and Koelsch, 2015 ). One theory of horror enjoyment, Zillmann’s (1980 , 1996) excitation transfer theory, argues that we derive our enjoyment of horror film from this feeling of suspense (this theory might also explain the enjoyment of non-horror film, which involves the invocation of suspense). When a threat is resolved, our negative affect converts to euphoria and suspense ends. The vital aspect of the theory is that enjoyment is derived from the degree of negative affect built up during exposure to the horror film and from the positive affect/reaction that results from the resolution of the threat. If the resolution does not occur, then residual negative affect will lead to increased dysphoria. If there is no suspense but a complete certainty about what will happen, suspense is replaced by dread ( Oliver, 1993a , b ). Very few studies have tested the theory, although limited reviews provide some support for the model ( Hoffner and Levine, 2005 ). Zillmann et al. (1975) showed children animated cartoons that varied in suspense and measured participants’ facial expressions, physiological arousal, and cognitive responses. They found that liking of the film increased as suspense increased. Liking was especially great when the threat was overcome, but the relationship between fear and liking was not examined in the study.

Individuals high in empathy will express more negative affect regardless of a successful resolution to the threat in the film ( Zillmann et al., 1986 ; Hoffner and Cantor, 1991 ; Sparks, 1991 ). Zillmann’s model has some difficulty accounting for the motivation to watch and for the enjoyment derived from horror films in which the sympathetic characters are (1) dispatched and (2) where the story does not end happily ( Hoffner and Levine, 2005 ). There is also evidence that enjoyment of horror may not be affected by the availability of resolution and that unresolved horror is perceived as just as enjoyable as resolved horror ( Hoffner and Cantor, 1991 ).

An alternative model to Zillmann’s suggests that enjoyment is associated with the presence of destruction, excitement, and unpredictability in films ( Sparks, 1986a , b ; Tamborini et al., 1987 ; Tamborini and Stiff, 1987 ). This model, the uses and gratification theory of film consumption ( Katz et al., 1973 ; Palmgreen, 1984 ), argues that the enjoyment and seeking out of material are determined by their specific need for stimulation and the satisfaction they derive following the achievement of gratification. Some research suggests that certain personality types and individuals who are high or low on some psychological traits may seek out horror or violent material for gratification but that the material itself may not always provide this satisfaction (see the Individual Differences section below). Sensation seeking, verbal aggression, and argumentativeness, for example, have been found to be positively correlated with enjoyment of horror and violent films, but these are not consistent predictors of liking for horror/violent material ( Greene and Krcmar, 2005 ).

Zillmann (1980) has argued that a positive outcome for the protagonist and a poor one for the antagonist are the key predictors of satisfaction with a film. If neither occurs but a threat is removed, this would also lead to a satisfactory experience, but the experience would be diluted. A positive outcome is, however, necessary for the “cognitive switch from dysphoria to euphoria” (p. 148). There is no consistent evidence to support this view and the success of films where the threat is still very much present in some way at the end of a horror film (e.g., The Exorcist, The Omen, Friday the 13th, and so on) and even in thrillers such as Basic Instinct and Presumed Innocent, suggests that this explanation may not account fully for why we watch and enjoy horror.

It has been proposed that arousal itself might be self-rewarding – the act of watching horror provides us with a thrill regardless of the resolution and we like and enjoy the film for this reason ( Tamborini, 1991 ). The pleasurable experience of arousal motivates us to continue watching in order to sustain that level of arousal, as Berlyne (1967) suggests. Sparks and Spirek (1988) , for example, found a positive correlation between skin conductance (a physiological measure of emotional arousal) and self-reported arousal in people who watched a clip of A Nightmare On Elm Street , suggesting that the arousal we report also correlates at the physiological level, although whether the psychophysiological changes determine the arousal or the cognitive and emotional arousals (the interpretation of the material) determine the psychophysiological changes is an argument, which dates back to James.

Individual Differences in Response to Horror

Carroll (2003) asked, “How can horror audiences find pleasure in what by nature is distressful and unpleasant?” Some research has attempted to answer this question by studying the type of individual who enjoys and likes horror. Some of the personality traits and cognitive/affective traits that have been implicated in horror preference and/or enjoyment of horror include sensation seeking, empathy, theory of mind, need for affect, the dark tetrad, and personality. Other individual differences include age and sex (considered later). Unless a person expresses an interest and liking of horror, the response to graphic violence tends not to be positive. Weaver and Wilson (2009) , for example, assigned 400 people to one of three groups who watched either clips from five television programs showing graphic violence, clips with the violence sanitized, or clips with the violence removed. The non-violent programs were regarded as more enjoyable than the violent versions, a finding which is consistent with earlier research indicating that removing the violent content from a film does not reduce the film’s enjoyment ( Sparks et al., 2005 ). A meta-analysis of the enjoyment of media violence (not horror film specifically) found that greater selective exposure to violence (i.e., choosing to watch violent media) leads to a reduction in the enjoyment of its content ( Weaver, 2011 ). The implication of this finding appears to be that even though individuals may seek out exposure to violent media, they do not often enjoy what they find. In addition, participants may vary according to the degree of material they are routinely exposed to. When graduate nursing students and psychology students were shown videos of graphic medical procedures, for example, the nurses expressed less disgust and fear but more sadness ( Vlahou et al., 2011 ). Both groups, however, showed evidence of psychophysiological arousal (measured via Galvanic Skin Response) in response to watching the procedures.

Sensation Seeking

The most widely studied trait in the research on horror is sensation seeking. According to Zuckerman (1994) , sensation seeking is the “seeking of varied, novel, complex and intense sensations and experiences, and the willingness to take physical, social, legal and financial risks for the sake of such experiences” (p. 27). It peaks in the teenage years and declines thereafter ( Zuckerman, 1988 ). Zuckerman’s measure of sensation seeking describes four related but different factors: (1) thrill and adventure seeking; (2) experience seeking; (3) disinhibition; and (4) boredom susceptibility. In the original conception of the model ( Zuckerman, 1979 ), individuals thought to be high sensation seekers would experience much more positive emotion when highly aroused and stimulated and would seek negative stimulation to maximize their arousal because this stimulation was intense. A negative stimulus (such as a horror film) might, therefore, be interpreted by a person high in sensation seeking as being very positive; but a person low in sensation-seeking would find the stimulus unpleasant. High sensation-seeking individuals would also be less vulnerable to the experience of threat in these films ( Franken et al., 1992 ).

All four factors of the sensation-seeking scale have been found to predict enjoyment of horror film to some extent, but some factors are better predictors than others. For example, disinhibition was found by Edwards (1984) to be the strongest predictor, followed by experience seeking, thrill and adventure seeking, and boredom susceptibility. Edwards reported a positive correlation between high sensation seeking (in general) and interest in horror film. Tamborini and Stiff (1987) found a positive correlation between liking for horror and a combination of the sensation-seeking factors. Zuckerman and Litle (1986) found that frequency of horror film attendance correlated with disinhibition, thrill and adventure seeking, and boredom susceptibility, but in men only. The sex difference in this study highlights an important constraint on the model, and that is, individual differences (such as sex) may interact with sensation-seeking type to predict viewing, preference for, or enjoyment of horror film (see below). Cantor and Sparks (1984) found that sensation seeking was positively correlated with the enjoyment of frightening films in men and women. However, components of sensation seeking predicted enjoyment differently – thrill and adventure seeking were the best predictor for men, whereas disinhibition was the best predictor for women.

Other studies have reported no positive correlation between sensation seeking and liking and enjoyment for horror films ( Neuendorf and Sparks, 1988 ). Aluja-Fabregat (2000) found that disinhibition and psychopathy – a personality trait which describes a charming, remorseless, callous, and manipulative personality type – correlated with curiosity about morbid events in 470 eighth graders in Catalan. Sensation seeking correlated with consumption of violent films and consumption was associated with psychopathy, specifically in boys.

In a study of the enjoyment of fear experiences in video gaming, Lynch and Martins (2015) found that in their sample of 269 18–24-year-old players, men reported more enjoyment of violent video games and played more games and played more often. Sensation seeking and enjoyment were positively correlated, with high sensation seekers reporting less frequent fear (although p = 0.05) and low empathizers enjoying the violent games more. Low empathizers also played more but did not play more frequently. Resident Evil was the most commonly played game, and the game’s inclusion of zombies and surprises was cited as a cause of fear and fright. Agency in such games, however, appears to be important to the experience of the medium. When players were either asked to watch or to play a horror computer game (Konami’s “ PT ”), players showed increased heart rate and galvanic skin response (emotional arousal) compared to participants who watched ( Madsen, 2016 ). There were no differences between the two groups in self-reported fear.

While sensation seeking might be strongly associated with enjoyment of horror, it may not be the strongest predictor of attendance at horror films. Tamborini and Stiff’s (1987) study of 155 people (78 men; average age 21 years) attending a horror film in a US Midwestern city reported that men and younger participants scored the highest on the sensation-seeking scale, but that men and women attended for different reasons: men attended because they sought sensation and to experience the destructive nature of the horror while women attended because of they wanted to experience a just ending. More important than sensation seeking appeared to be participants’ expectations of the film: The greatest predictor of film attendance was not sensation seeking but a desire to experience a satisfying resolution (especially by women) and to see destruction (men).

Also of note is that there is evidence that sensation seeking is related to the startle potentiation described earlier. Lissek and Powers (2003) found that people low in sensation seeking (as measured via the thrill and adventure-seeking subscale) produced the typical startle potentiation during the viewing of threatening (vs. neutral) images but that those high in sensation seeking showed equal levels of startle to neutral and threatening images. One explanation for this finding is that high levels of sensation seeking are related to low levels of reactivity to threatening images. Because high sensation seeking involves a degree of sensory overload, less stimulation is required for a startle potentiation to occur and those scoring high in sensation seeking show less fear startle potentiation.

The literature on sensation seeking, therefore, suggests that this trait and specific components of it, especially disinhibition, may predict enjoyment of horror film, but this prediction does not apply to men and women consistently (a conclusion considered in more detail in the section on sex differences below). The literature also highlights a limitation in this – and other areas – of the horror research literature in that samples are often heterogeneous, the film selections are heterogeneous, and sample sizes tend to be small. These limitations are returned to at the end of the review.

Empathy is a multidimensional concept whose components have been defined in different ways but which in general are reflected in two types: a cognitive component (e.g., perspective taking) and an affective/emotional component (sympathy and concern for others and sharing of negative affect). One model suggests that empathy comprises a wandering imagination (a tendency to fantasize and daydream about fictional situations), fictional involvement (transposition of oneself into a story), humanistic mentation (a sensitivity to the emotional welfare of others), and emotional contagion (a susceptibility to be influenced by the emotions around oneself) ( Tamborini et al., 1990 ). Zillmann has proposed a three-factor model of empathy in which emotional behavior arises from the interaction of between these dispositional (a “response-guiding” mechanisms, which result in motor reactions to a stimulus), excitatory (“response-energizing” mechanism, which enables immediate arousal), and experiential (the conscious experience of the first two). Davis (1983) , who originally developed the Interpersonal Reactivity Index, argued that empathy was not a unitary or binary concept but was best considered as a set of constructs, which involve our reactions to others but are distinct from each other. These constructs included perspective taking, a fantasy scale (which measures the degree to which a person transposes themselves into the feelings or actions of fictional characters), empathetic concern (which measures the degree of sympathy felt for others), and personal distress (a description of unease or distress experienced in interpersonal relationships).

There is evidence that each component can predict enjoyment of horror film, with low empathy consistently associated with greater enjoyment. In one study ( Tamborini et al., 1990 ), 95 young people in same-sex pairs watched clips from two 1-h documentaries or two full length horror films ( A Nightmare on Elm Street and Boogens ). The study found that tendency to daydream and fantasize predicted the ability to sense the feelings and actions of the films’ characters. Those scoring high on the wandering item, fictional involvement, humanistic mentation, and contagion scales described above found graphic horror less appealing. Those scoring low in empathy preferred graphic horror. People low in fearfulness also prefer graphic horror ( Mundorf et al., 1989 ). Hall and Bracken’s (2011) study of 199 undergraduates found that fantasy empathy (but no other type) predicted narrative transportation (immersion in a text/film or “getting lost” in a story) and was associated with increased enjoyment of the film, although not necessarily horror film exclusively.

In a variant of this procedure, Tamborini et al. (1993) asked participants to watch a pleasant (a comedy) or an unpleasant ( Videodrome ) film, with a confederate. To evoke empathy, after the film, the confederate said they were distressed because they thought they were going to be thrown out of school and asked “what am I going to do?” If there was no reply, the confederate left. If they received a reply, the responses would be rejected. Those participants scoring high in fictional involvement and empathetic concern provided more comfort and more social support. Those who watched the horror film, however, provided less support than did those who watched the comedy. While providing a potentially useful contribution to the study of how people respond to horror and the effect of this on our interaction with others – the greater the empathy, the greater the responsiveness to others’ distress – the sample size is small ( N = 21).

Empathy has also been associated with less enjoyment of suffering displayed in frightening films but with more enjoyment of danger, of excitement, and of happy endings ( Hoffner, 2009 ). People high in enduring negative affect have been found to experience more distress and less enjoyment of suffering. Those who had prior exposure to frightening films enjoyed danger more and enjoyed happy endings less.

Classifying participants according to the degree of empathy and sensation seeking has not been the only approach that has been taken to determining the types of people who watch and enjoy/prefer horror. Johnston (1995) , for example, notes that not all audiences respond to horror in the same way, as this section has demonstrated and has typologized viewers and their motivations to watch into three types: (1) resolved-ending types; (2) thrill watchers; and (3) gore watchers. Resolved-ending types enjoy film with a satisfying, definite closure; thrill watchers enjoy being frightened and empathize with the principal characters; gore watchers watch because they enjoy the destructiveness in film. The typology is based on some of the research reviewed here. A prediction that can be made from this typology is that thrill watchers will have higher levels of empathy and adventure seeking, whereas gore watchers will be low in empathy and fearfulness but will be high in adventure seeking and will seek out high arousal ( King and Hourani, 2007 ). Research suggests that gore watchers are curious about the ways people are killed, are vindictive (they require satisfaction that characters receive their just desserts), and are attracted to blood and guts (gore) in film ( King and Hourani, 2007 ). Gore watchers are more likely to be men, to identify with the killer in films and are less likely to identify with the victim.

King and Hourani identified types of watchers from 229 individuals and showed them four horror films. Half the sample saw the films with a traditional ending (in which the evil antagonist is destroyed) or with teaser endings (in which the evil antagonist is revived/resurrected). The traditional ending was more entertaining than was the teaser ending, but it was especially enjoyable and entertaining for high gore and thrill watchers than low gore and thrill watchers. Traditional endings were less distressing and more frightening for high than low gore watchers and were regarded as being more frightening by high thrill watchers. High thrill watchers found the teaser ending version of the film to be less scary than did low thrill watchers. High gore watchers regarded the teaser to be more predictable than did low thrill watchers. The traditional ending was considered to be less predictable by high gore watchers than by high thrill watchers and by high thrill watchers than by low thrill watchers. Very little research exists on this typology, however.

Although individual studies indicate a relationship between empathy and horror enjoyment, a meta-analysis of studies investigating the enjoyment of mediated fright and violence has found that empathetic concern and personal distress were negatively correlated with enjoyment, but correlations for personal distress were not consistent ( Hoffner and Levine, 2005 ). The authors note that the inconsistencies may be attributable to differences in the content of the film employed in these studies, and this is a problematic issue common to the field: There are no consistently chosen materials in either nature, content, length, age, or narrative. What is noteworthy, however, is that Hoffner and Levine’s review found that the strongest effects (reported in two studies) were for studies, which included horror films, and those films depicted torture ( Johnston, 1995 ) or brutal horror with no positive resolution ( Tamborini et al., 1990 ). When these studies were removed, the correlation between empathy and enjoyment became non-significant. The authors note that the other four films measured participants’ enjoyment of horror film as a genre (rather than their enjoyment of specific horror films or acts of graphic violence), and this methodological limitation in the literature is returned to the conclusion of this paper.

Need for Affect

A different form of individual difference – need for affect – may also mediate horror film preference and enjoyment, but the literature is limited. Need for affect ( Maio and Esses, 2001 ) is based on the assumption that we are motivated to seek interesting or positive experiences and avoid unpleasant ones. Need for Affect (NfA) is measured via a questionnaire, which comprises two subscales: the tendency to approach and the tendency to withdraw. People who prefer sad films experience more enjoyment when watching sad films, for example, because they regard viewing sad films as an enjoyable and a gratifying experience; their need for affect is satisfied by watching sad films ( Oliver, 1993a , b ; Oliver et al., 2000 ; Maio and Esses, 2001 ). Few studies have explored the relationship between NfA and horror film viewing. One study asked 119 attendees (mean age = 23 years) at a German cinema how likely they would be to watch United 93 or the 2006 horror film remake, The Omen ( Bartsch et al., 2010 ). Participants with higher NfA approach scores experienced more intense emotions and experienced more negative emotions such as anger, fear, and disgust. United 93 evoked more negative emotions than did The Omen . Higher NfA withdraw scores were associated with a more negative evaluation of emotions. Controlling for personality did not affect these results significantly. While NfA is little studied in horror, one possible research question that could be explored is whether preference for film genres correlates with NfA; no study to date has systematically examined this relationship.

Other Personality Traits

Other personality traits thought to be implicated in horror film preference or enjoyment include the Big Five, the Dark Tetrad, and repressive coping style. Dark personality traits are those which express some abnormal, sinister, and unpleasant aspect of behavior. Four such traits are Machiavellianism, Narcissism, Psychopathy (described earlier), and Sadism. Machiavellianism (the enjoyment of power and the manipulation of power) has been found to correlate with enjoyment of horror, and the correlations between these two variables are stronger than the correlation between Machiavellianism and sensation seeking ( Tamborini and Stiff, 1987 ). High psychopathy scores have been associated with preference for graphically violent horror movies ( Weaver, 1991 ), and individuals scoring high in callousness and who habitually express little or no emotion show reduced facial expressions of sadness and disgust when watching violent films ( Fanti et al., 2017 ).

A repressive coping style is characterized by the repression of negative affect caused by stressors ( Weinberger, 1990 ; Sparks et al., 1999 ). Sparks et al. investigated repressive coping style and enjoyment of horror film stimuli in 59 individuals. Based on a median split, 30 repressors and 29 non-repressors were identified and were asked to view a 25-min extract from When A Stranger Calls (in which a babysitter receives frightening phone calls and discovers that the calls have been coming from inside the house she is in). Women in general expressed greater negative affect than did men, as expected (see section below), but the repressors in general showed greater physiological arousal during the film than did non-repressors. An interesting pattern emerged across the course of exposure. Physiological arousal was similar for both groups at the beginning of the first two sections of the movie and then diverged in the final three sections as the suspense increased. No explicit analysis was provided of the psychometric response to the film (how much it was liked, how frightening it was, and so on). The study suggests that those who repress negative affect may nonetheless show high levels of physiological arousal during exposure to frightening films. What is less clear in this study is the relationship between this phenomenon and enjoyment of the film. It is also based on a very low sample of participants, and little subsequent research has focused on this particular personality trait/style.

Despite being the most commonly accepted model of personality, the Big Five has been the focus of very little published research in the context of horror film enjoyment and consumption. The Big Five proposes that personality is comprised of five core traits along which individuals differ. These traits are Conscientiousness, Openness to Experience, Extraversion, Neuroticism, and Agreeableness. One study employing a version of the Big Five found that a trait described as Intellect/Imagination (defined as a proclivity to engage in imaginative activity) was the strongest predictor of horror media consumption ( Clasen et al., 2019 ). There was a small but statistically significant and positive correlation between extraversion and frequency of horror media use, using horror media with others, enjoying horror media with others and being more scared with others. Agreeableness was positively correlated with being easily scared by horror media, using horror media with others, enjoying horror media with others, and negatively correlated with being more scared with others. People high in conscientiousness were less scared after using horror media, and people high in emotional stability were found to be less easily scared than those low in emotional stability, a finding which was also reported by Reynaud et al. (2012) , who found that psychophysiological arousal was greater in participants who were high in neuroticism when they watched a film designed to elicit fear. The number of participants in Reynaud et al.’s study, however, was small.

The finding regarding agreeableness contrasts with research on violent video game playing where people lower in agreeableness have been found to be more frequent violent video games players; individuals who score high in extraversion and openness and low in neuroticism have also been found to be more frequent users ( Chory and Goodboy, 2011 ). Low agreeableness is a significant predictor of enjoyment of the horror film genre but not exclusively – it is also a significant predictor of enjoyment of parody, animation, neo-noir, and cult genres across different media including books, television, and film ( Cantador et al., 2013 ). While the findings of Chory and Goodboy (2011) are informative, they are limited in terms of the measurement of response to horror film specifically because the stimuli used were not specifically horror film. A similar limitation can be found in Clasen et al.’s (2019) large Mechanical Turk study of 1,070 participants which asked participants for their responses to and perceptions of horror media generally, not horror film specifically. The study also administered a variant of the Big Five personality inventory and a variant of the sensation-seeking scale (Hoyle et al.’s (2002, Brief Sensation Seeking Scale) not normally administered in research examining the relationship between personality and horror film. Although research on violent video games might help understand some of the correlates between use frequency and personality trait, it should be acknowledged that violent video games are qualitatively different stimuli to films. Films are a passive experience – viewers are unable to influence the action they see on screen – whereas gaming is specifically an active experience where the player engages with what they see and are expected to do so as this is the principal motivation for gaming. Horror films and horror games are not equivalent stimuli, although they share many characteristics and elements of content.

In conclusion, the literature studying the relationship between personality and horror film consumption has been limited in number and scope. Two studies have reported a correlation between low agreeableness and preference/enjoyment of horror media, and one has not. It is noteworthy that in one of the studies reporting an association, agreeableness was the only trait to be significantly associated with horror media use. This aspect of personality may be worth exploring further.

Sex Differences

The most consistent individual difference predicting individuals’ response to horror film is biological sex: men and boys enjoy frightening and violent visual material more than do women and girls ( Zuckerman and Litle, 1986 ; Harris et al., 2000 ; Hoffner and Levine, 2005 ). Correlations between intensity of “scary media” or horror and the enjoyment of horror in men are consistently positive ( Hoffner and Levine, 2005 ). Men enjoy horror media more than do women, are less scared by horror media, use horror media more, and show a greater preference for frightening horror media ( Clasen et al., 2019 ). One of the earliest experimental studies of sex differences investigated the role of social comparison in individuals’ response to horror. Zillmann et al. (1986) asked 36 men and 36 female undergraduates to watch horror films ( Nightmares , Nightmare on Elm Street ) in the presence of a same-age, opposite-sex companion who either expressed control, indifference, or distress during the film. Men enjoyed the horror more and found it less boring and more satisfying and frightening than did women. Men expressed more distress if the female companion expressed distress (but engaged more with them than with a masterful woman) and less if the female companion was masterful. Zillmann et al. also manipulated initial appeal of the companion (high and low). Women enjoyed the films more in the company of a man with high appeal, but women’s appeal had little effect on men’s responses. Women engaged more with masterful than with distressed men. Cutting violence from films can increase enjoyability and decrease arousal in women (but has no effect on men): women regard these films to be generally more disturbing than do men ( Berry et al., 1999 ).

Male undergraduates experience less distress and anxiety than do women when watching horror film ( Sparks, 1991 ), and women find film clips depicting sadness and fear more unpleasant and distressing; they also show greater arousal to fear clips than to clips depicting compassion ( Davydov et al., 2013 ; Maffei et al., 2015 ). The findings reflect a more general sex difference in that women, in general, report greater fear and anxiety than do men. Women have been found to express more fears, more severe fears, and greater fear of repulsive but harmless animals ( Tucker and Bond, 1997 ), a finding that applies cross-culturally ( Arrindell et al., 2004 ). Anxiety disorders are more commonly reported by women than men ( McLean and Anderson, 2009 ), and women appear to be more susceptible to variety of anxiety-related disorders such as panic disorder, generalized anxiety disorder, PTSD, and agoraphobia ( Kessler et al., 1994 ). The exception to this pattern is fear of bodily injury, social stimuli, noise, or enclosed spaces, where no consistent sex differences have been reported ( McLean and Anderson, 2009 ). Disgust sensitivity – the degree to which individuals find stimuli repulsive – also tends to be higher in women, and this phenomenon might provide an explanation for the sex difference in the fear of animals – and horror film ( Connolly et al., 2008 ). This is considered in more detail below. Women and girls, for example, are less likely to enjoy violent media when blood and gore portrayed are described as extreme, rather than mild or moderate ( Hoffner and Levine, 2005 ).

The sex difference is not only reported in the horror genre but also across a number of cinematic genres. One study of 150 undergraduates in Germany ( Wühr et al., 2017 ) asked participants to indicate which types of films they believed that men and women would generally prefer. In a second study, participants were asked to indicate the films they themselves preferred. In the first study, men were regarded as preferring action, adventure, erotic, fantasy, historical, horror, sci-fi, thriller, war, and western films, whereas women preferred animation, comedy, drama, heimat, and romantic films. Both sexes liked crime and mystery equally. In the second study, women expressed a preference for drama and romance, and men preferred action, adventure, erotic, fantasy, horror, mystery, sci-fi, war, and Western films. Animation, comedy, crime heist, history, and thrillers were liked by both sexes.

Enjoyment and liking of the degree of explicit (graphic) horror also appear to show sex differences. Men tend to prefer very graphic horror material more than do women ( Hoffner and Levine, 2005 ). Men also report watching more violent television and attend more horror films. One explanation for this finding has been proposed by gender socialization theory ( Zaslow and Hayes, 1986 ), whereby boys and men are socialized to not be afraid and to not make expressive shows of fear, whereas girls are not constrained by such expectations and can “express their sensitivity by being appropriately disturbed” ( Hoffner and Levine, 2005 ). Such an explanation is probably locked in a prison of its own time in the sense that it is unclear whether such attitudes still exist now, at the end of the second decade of the twenty-first century.

Sex differences have been reported in the context of other behaviors such as the identification with a film’s character. Tamborini et al. (1987) asked 44 male and 50 female undergraduates to rank their preference for two different versions of 13 films (12 of which were fictional). In one version, the victim of graphic violence was male; in the other, the victim was female. One theory of horror enjoyment discussed earlier (the uses and gratification perspective; Rubin, 1994 ) argues that our reasons for watching horror and the benefit and gratification we derive from it will determine whether we identify with a victim or an aggressor ( Johnston, 1995 ). Viewers who identify with a female victim are usually more likely to experience distress ( Zillmann and Cantor, 1977 ) and are not satisfied by happy endings ( Tannenbaum and Gaer, 1965 ). Oliver’s (1993a , b) study of 96 16-year-old high school students found that there was a correlation between gore watchers and enjoyment of retribution (liking to see victims get what they deserve). Participants’ high punitive sexual attitudes have been found to be positively correlated with higher ratings of enjoyment; men prefer horror films in which the female rather than the male is the victim, but there is no significant association between enjoyment and the films’ portrayal of victimization of sexual characters, of women, or of women expressing their sexuality.

Tamborini et al. (1987) found that participants’ recent and past viewing of horror film strongly predicted enjoyment of graphic horror in general. However, the responses to men and women as victims in the film interacted with other viewing preferences. For example, men’s enjoyment of pornography was correlated with preference for graphic horror, which depicted female victimization but not male victimization. Preference for graphic horror correlated with disinhibition, moderately for boredom susceptibility and experience seeking, and not at all for thrill/adventure seeking. Sensation seeking in general did not predict preference for graphic horror. Women regarded the films with female victims to be higher in violent content than films featuring male victims; the opposite pattern was found in men. Boredom susceptibility was a good predictor of preference for graphic horror in men. No one factor was a strong predictor of graphic horror preference in women when the victim was male. Deceit and boredom susceptibility predicted graphic horror preference when the victim was female. Physiological arousal (measured via GSR) has also been correlated with enjoyment of horror after men finish watching a film ( Sparks, 1991 ).

A retrospective study of 233 psychology students (125 men) asked participants to recall details of a date they had been on as a teenager/young adult during which they watched a frightening film ( Harris et al., 2000 ). The participants reported that the films most commonly seen were Scream, Scream 2 , I Know What You Did Last Summer, and I Still Know What You Did Last Summer . Men were younger when they watched the film (16.7 vs. 17.6 years), and the study found some notable and significant sex differences: Thirty-one percent of women reported looking away from the screen, whereas only 7% of men did. About 61% of women reported feeling anxious, whereas 44% of men did; 34% women reported that it had increased their imagination (men – 1%); 19% of women said they feared sleeping alone afterward (men – 8%); 67% of women said their heartbeat were faster (men – 53%); 56% of women said they became very jumpy (men – 31%); 41% of women were amused and entertained (men – 59%); 55% of women held onto their date (men – 21%); 32% of women screamed (men – 6%); and 26% of women felt disgusted (men – 10%). Men gave more positive reactions than did women, and women gave more negative reactions than did men, and women reported more sleep disturbances than did men. About 80% of women reported being somewhat or very afraid (men – 46%), and 18% reported not being afraid or being a little afraid (men – 51%). This study also measured empathy and found a positive correlation between overall empathy scale scores and negative reactions but not between negative reactions and any one specific subscale. There were some associations between negative reactions and empathetic responses. Low empathetic concern, for example, predicted sleep disturbance. Higher boredom susceptibility was associated with fewer negative reactions and with increased liking but not with sleep disturbance. Women who scored high on empathy were more likely to be scared at the time of the study (i.e., they were more likely to express fear as adults) than were low-scoring women or men generally.

In a similar study, Hoekstra et al. (1999) asked 202 introductory psychology students to describe their reactions (especially fear reactions) when they recalled the frightening movies they watched as children. The mean age at watching was 10.8 years, a similar finding to Cantor (2004) . Female participants as adults liked slasher films less than did male participants as adults – of the 14 categories included, this was the least liked by women. The most liked genre by women was romantic comedy; by men, action and adventure. Men reported choosing to watch horror more often than did women. Both sexes noted fear-related changes after watching films as children but not during the film, with women reporting more negative reactions during the watching of the films when they were girls. The earlier their exposure to horror films as children, the greater was the sleeping disturbance they experienced afterward. The behavioral measures indicated the typical sex differences reported earlier: more girls than men hid their eyes (64 vs. 26%), held someone (35 vs. 6%), and were jumpy (65 vs. 45%).

In terms of the enjoyment of specific content, one study asked participants to rate a 10-min horror film in which the sex of the victim and sexual content was manipulated ( Oliver, 1994 ). The context of this study concerned the types of victim and protagonist in slasher films. An earlier content analysis of 10 slasher films found that a third of sex scenes concluded with the death of a character ( Weaver, 1991 ). Women, however, are not more likely to be killed. In an analysis of 56 slasher films, Cowan and O’Brien (1990) found that men and women were equally likely to be killed off. Women were more likely to be survivors, a cliche that has its own term in horror film: the Final Girl. More screen time is devoted to the deaths of women than men, however, and non-surviving women are more likely to be promiscuous, wear revealing clothes, appear nude, use sexual language, and undress and engage in sex when they are killed. Non-surviving men appear to be identified only by their use of sexual language. Oliver (1994) found that sexual portrayals of victims were associated with increased viewer enjoyment, especially in men. These films were also regarded as more frightening.

As discussed earlier, one possible explanation for women’s reaction to horror may be their disgust sensitivity. Women in general report greater disgust sensitivity than do men. Disgust is a protective response to a direct threat to survival, such as contamination, lesions, sores, or disease ( Krusemark and Li, 2011 ). People high in disgust sensitivity show higher levels of disgust toward low, moderate, and severe facial disfigurement ( Shanmugarajah et al., 2012 ). Individuals with anxiety disorders are more prone to be disgusted, especially those who are anxious about contagion ( Olatunji et al., 2017a , b ). People who are exposed to disease primes are more likely to judge themselves to be less extravert and open to experience ( Mortensen et al., 2010 ), and people distance themselves from contagion or symptoms of contagion ( Neuberg et al., 2011 ). Women’s disgust thresholds for imagining incest, reacting to images of insects, seeing open sores, feces or dirty clothing, and statements about death and sex are significantly lower than those for men, and women are less likely to work in environments in which pathogen exposure is likely ( Al-Shawaf et al., 2018 ). Women’s sexual disgust and pathogen disgust are higher than that for men, but their moral disgust appears to be no difference. This elevated sense of disgust sensitivity in women may partly explain why they enjoy horror film less than do men.

The literature on sex differences in response to, and preference for, horror film provides the most consistent finding in the field that men and boys prefer and enjoy horror film more than do girls and women. One possible explanation for this, besides differences in empathy, may lie in differences in higher-order traits such as anxiety proneness and disgust sensitivity. This possibility, and the evidence for it, is discussed in a later section.

Horror Films and Mental Health

While a typical person’s response to horror film is fear and anxiety, some studies have suggested that exposure to horror films can lead to abnormal stress or distress reactions requiring psychological or psychiatric intervention, a condition called cinematic neurosis ( Ballon and Leszcz, 2007 ). The rarity of these case studies and the details they present – Ballon and Leszcz found only seven such case studies – suggests that the individuals’ behavior arise because of causes unrelated to the horror film and that the horror film was a catalyst for provoking an underlying and pre-existing pathology that would have been provoked by any, other relevant stimuli. The pattern of behavior has echoes in Freud’s (1919/1971) account of seventeenth century “demonological neurosis,” whereby depression or psychosis arose from experiencing the death of a father and individuals made a pact with the Devil to relieve their distress.

According to Johnson (1980) , at least a quarter of horror film viewers had experienced “stress-type” reactions, although this is likely to be within the confines of the normal stress reaction that horror is specifically designed to evoke. Many of the studies reported are case studies, lacking in control participants and largely anecdotal. In a typical example, Horowitz and Wilner (1976) observed that after the release of The Exorcist in 1973, individuals lost “control over thought and emotions,” experiencing “denial and numbing … extremes of anxiety, tension and impaired relationships.” The Exorcist is the source of a number of abnormal behaviors reported by individuals responding extremely to horror film.

Bozzuto (1975) described four adults who developed abnormal stress behavior within a day of watching the film; participants reported insomnia, excitability, hyperactivity, irritability, and decreased appetite. The symptoms dissipated after seven sessions of psychotherapy. Mathai (1983) reported the case of a distressed 12-year-old boy who felt that when somebody touched him, they would go right through him and that when sitting on a chair, he would fall through it. Prior to presentation, he had watched The Invasion Of The Body Snatchers with two of his siblings. Waking from his sleep, he saw “an awful face with bulging veins staring at him.” Hamilton (1978) reported the case of a young woman who had seen The Exorcist and presented with “acute unremitting anxiety and a pervasive fear of being alone especially at night” and refused to go to work. She felt that the “Devil was in a young girl” and “she dreamt of the Devil with a penis in his mouth” (p. 569).

Five of the cases identified by Ballon and Leszcz (2007) cited The Exorcist as the cause of their distress. The other two were Jaws and Invasion Of The Body Snatchers . Robinson and Barnett (1975) reported the case of a 17-year-old girl who had watched Jaws and experienced anxiety and sleep disturbances consequently. She was found the next day jerking her limbs, screaming about sharks. Turley and Derdeyn (1990) reported the case of a 13-year-old boy who became “addicted” to horror films, particularly A Nightmare On Elm Street . One study found that two 10-year-old boys experienced anxiety for up to 8 weeks after watching the TV program Ghostwatch ( Simons and Silveira, 1994 ). Symptoms included fear of ghosts and of the dark, refusal to go upstairs alone, nightmares, sleeping with the light on, and panic attacks. Ballon and Leszcz (2007) reported the case of a 22-year-old unemployed woman with three children who were at 23 weeks’ gestation but felt possessed and had flashbacks of watching The Exorcist . According to the authors, all of the cases of “cinematic neurosis” they reviewed involved individuals who had experienced a recent loss (or potential loss) of a family member about whom they were ambivalent. Individuals also held strong religious or cultural ideals, and their behavior included recalling imagery from the films they had seen. The films also appeared to have some personal meaning to the individuals.

Sparks (1989a , b) found that around half of the women and the quarter of the men surveyed in his study reported enduring fright after watching horror. Women appeared to be particularly affected ( Sparks et al., 1993 ) with around half of the women subsequently avoiding such films, 68% perceiving specific rooms as anxiety provoking (compared with 10% of men), and 43% reporting nervousness. Harrison and Cantor (1999) found that 90% of their sample of 136 young people (average age – 20.6 years) had experienced a film that was so frightening that the experience had lasted beyond the viewing of the film. More than 50% of the sample reported sleep disturbances and eating problems.

The rarity of such extreme emotion distress requiring psychiatric intervention suggests that horror film, while designed to evoke fear and panic, has no significant long-term consequences than can impair an individual’s mental, social, and occupational function and that those individuals who do report this impairment in functioning have other characteristics or have undergone other experiences, which may underlie the condition they report. While there is no evidence that exposure to horror films has adverse or sustained effects on mental health in individuals with no pre-existing mental health issue, there is evidence that watching horror films can lead to self-reported short-term anxiety and disturbed sleep.

Development of Fear and Horror Liking/Avoidance

Children express fear to horror, just as adults do, and they also express enjoyment of horror and graphic violence, just as some adults do, and some have argued that this interest peaks at adolescence ( Twitchell, 1989 ). The form of the stimulus children fear appears to change as they develop, with unfamiliar or threatening versions of concrete objects the source of anxiety in infancy and imaginary and symbolic stimuli the source of fear in the pre-school years. Fear stimuli become more concrete and realistic when children are at school age ( Hyson, 1979 ). Bauer (1976) found that drawings of imaginary feared objects decreased with age (from kindergarten to age 11 or 12), whereas depictions of realistic injury increased. Fright reactions occur to violence, injury, or physical danger ( Cantor and Wilson, 1988 ).

Early Childhood

An early study of children’s preferences for scary movies found that 24% of 43 7–8-year olds and 13% of 46 11–12-year olds reported having nightmares, and younger girls reported more fears than did younger boys ( Palmer et al., 1983 ). Younger boys liked scary films more than did younger girls. About 40% of the younger children liked scary programs; 65% of the older children did. Seven percent of older children and 28% of younger children disliked scary films; 68% of younger children said they avoided scary TV shows, whereas 11% of the older group did. Cantor and Reilly (1982) found that 11–12-year olds reported avoiding frightening TV and films more than did 15–16-year olds, and Cantor et al. (2010) found that the most common content causing fear in 219 8.5-year olds was the supernatural (imaginary/fictional monsters) with someone being hurt the next most common. Having a television in the bedroom was the best predictor of fright severity, and the average age of exposure to stimuli was 6.6 years; 67% were able to provide the name of the show. Seventy-one percent could not stop thinking about the experience; 52% worried about it; 36% reported shaking; 59% did not want to sleep alone; and 56% had nightmares. When another sample ( N = 164) was asked why they watched, 40% said it was because they wanted to and 40% because someone else was watching. A study of 314 7–12-year-old Dutch children’s response to TV-induced fright found that interpersonal violence was the most fear-inducing content and fantasy the least; the films, which caused the greatest fear, had been intended for adult audiences – Gremlins, IT, Commissaris Rex, and The X Files ( Valkenburg et al., 2000 ). Girls experienced more fear than did boys but fear in both sexes declined with age. Girls physically intervened and used social support and escape more than did boys. Cognitive reassurance was the most common coping strategy, and social support was the least common.

How children cope with horror has been the subject of some research on child development and horror because of the potentially harmful psychological consequences of exposure to frightening stimuli. Cantor and Wilson’s (1988) review of the effect of horror stimuli on children’s behavior concluded that two methods of coping were generally employed. Non-cognitive strategies were those which did not involve the processing of verbal information and which might involve desensitization (the gradual exposure to the fear stimulus); cognitive strategies were those whereby children were encouraged to think about the source of their fear as a means of coping with the stimulus. There is evidence that desensitization is successful ( Wilson and Cantor, 1987 ). For example, children (5–7 and 8–9 year olds) who had been gradually introduced to a videotape of snakes showed less fear when watching the snake pit scene from Raiders Of The Lost Ark . A similar effect was found in a study of 5–7- and 8–11-year olds in which participants played with a rubber tarantula and later saw a scene from Kingdom Of The Spiders ( Wilson, 1987 ), and in a group of kindergarteners and 5–6-, 7–8-, and 6–9-year-old children who were exposed to photographs of worms and then saw a frightening film featuring worms. The children who had been previously exposed to the creatures enjoyed the film more than did those not exposed; exposure to live worms reduced the fear evoked by the film in boys ( Weiss et al., 1993 ). Cantor et al. (1988) found that 3–5-, 6–7-, and 9–10-year-old children’s fear of the Hulk in The Incredible Hulk could be reduced if children saw a TV program, which showed the making of the TV series, and how the make-up of Lou Ferrigno (the actor who played the Hulk) was applied. Children of different ages become afraid at different stages of the TV program and the Hulk’s transformation ( Sparks and Cantor, 1986 ): 3–5-year olds became more frightened after the transformation, whereas 9–11-year olds became more frightened before the transformation. Cantor et al.’s finding is also anecdotally illustrated in the preface to Englund (2009) . Here, Wes Craven (the director of A Nightmare On Elm Street ) describes filming Robert Englund (Freddy Krueger in Elm Street) explaining that he was the actor who played a character so that the video could be sent to a distressed child who found Krueger very frightening.

Younger children (4- and 5-year olds) appear to benefit from adopting more physical strategies such as holding on to a blanket/toy or eating/drinking ( Wilson et al., 1987 ). The reasons for the success of this strategy might be the provision of relief from anxiety and the provision of tactile contact in linguistically developing children or by the occupation of working memory, which reduces the cognitive resources available to think about and process fear stimuli. Proximity to a parent is perceived as being the most successful fear-reduction coping strategy in young children ( Wilson et al., 1987 ). Very young children (under 2 years) experience less fear through covering their eyes; in 3–5-year olds, this behavior increases fear ( Wilson, 1989 ).

Cognitive strategies, such as talking about films and programs with parents or other adults, have been found to be effective ( Cantor and Wilson, 1988 ). By far, the most common type of cognitive strategy employed by parents is reassuring children that the stimulus children are afraid of does not exist ( Cantor and Hoffner, 1990 ), although this is likely to be successful in older children but not in younger children (4–5 years; Cantor and Wilson, 1984 ). Explaining that the source of fear is not likely to be harmful is also successful in older (8–9 year old) children ( Wilson and Cantor, 1987 ). Wilson and Cantor’s study, which involved informing children that most snakes were not poisonous and telling them about the behavior of snakes, found that these instructions increased fear in 5–7-year olds. Verbal explanations may be ineffective in younger children who are less likely to discuss horror materials with their parents. Cantor et al. (1986) found that none of their 3–7-year-old children discussed a film with parents, but 43% of 8–12-year olds and 50% of 13–18-year olds did. However, verbal priming prior to seeing the film can sometimes increase the child’s emotional response to what they (see Cantor et al., 1984 ). If children are informed that a film has a happy ending, they report less fear ( Hoffner and Cantor, 1990 ; Hoffner, 1997 ). Introducing probability information about events prior to watching a film such as telling children the likelihood of an event occurring appears to have no effect on 5–9-year olds’ emotional response ( Cantor and Hoffner, 1990 ). If children rehearse verbal information (e.g., “this tarantula cannot hurt people; they are not poisonous”), older and younger children respond less emotionally to a film about tarantulas ( Wilson, 1987 ). Children also regard the spiders as less dangerous after being given these instructions.

Two physical means of coping with frightening stimuli studied in children are blunting (avoiding threat or transforming a threat by distraction; looking away, for example) and monitoring (being action oriented and attending to the threat). Sparks and Spirek (1988) found that high blunters and low monitors were less physiologically aroused by horror films than were high monitors and low blunters suggesting that underlying physiology might predict or predispose individuals to react in a given emotional way to frightening stimuli; Sparks (1989a , b) also found that low monitors were less negative about horror when given information about the film but this information had no effect on blunters. A study of 228 14–15- and 15–16-year olds examined the role of blunting and monitoring on coping with scary films ( Hoffner, 1995 ). Hoffner investigated empathetic concern (EC, other-oriented) and personal distress (PD, feelings of anxiety/discomfort in response to suffering) by examining four coping methods – interpersonal comfort (IC), distraction (D), momentary avoidance (MA), and unreality. Davis and Kraus (1997) had previously reported that high empathetic concern was associated with less loneliness and unsociability; high personal distress was associated with shyness, poor interpersonal functioning, and social anxiety. Empathetic concern was found to encourage altruism, whereas personal distress prompted people to reduce their own emotion expression ( Batson, 1987 ).

Hoffner found a series of interesting results. A belief that something was unreal was the most common coping strategy, followed by interpersonal comfort and momentary avoidance; these were used more than was distraction. About 50% of the sample considered unreality and momentary avoidance to be effective; 26% considered distraction to be effective. The study found that boys preferred scary films more than did girls, a finding consistent with the literature, that girls reported more empathetic concern and personal distress, that personal distress correlated with empathy and with monitoring and blunting, that these correlated negatively with liking for scary films, that blunting predicted use of distraction and unreality, that monitoring was more widely used and was more effective, that monitoring and blunting were associated with increased interpersonal comfort, that girls were more likely to use momentary avoidance and interpersonal comfort and consider them more effective, that people who reported using one strategy were more likely to use all four, that empathy, but not personal distress, was associated with greater use of reality, IC and personal distress were associated with increased use of distraction, and that higher empathy scores were associated with greater use of Unreality. People who liked horror were less likely to use distraction, unreality, and momentary avoidance as coping strategies, which suggest that coping is related to the dislike of horror – it is something that must be done to mitigate the effects of something that is disliked. If people thought the coping strategies worked, they enjoyed the films more.

Hoffner also noted that participants who reported finding scary films and television to be violent were likely to use all four coping mechanisms; those who found the material to be realistic were more likely to report using distraction, unreality, and interpersonal comfort as coping mechanisms. Material featuring blood and gore was more likely to lead to the use of momentary avoidance. Girls reported using momentary avoidance and interpersonal comfort more than did boys and considered these to be more effective strategies than did boys.

Adolescence

As children enter adolescence, their reasons for seeking out horror develop and change – they will watch to be thrilled, to rebel (because parents have prohibited them), or to enjoy gore because they are interested in how people die ( Oliver, 1993a , b ). One study of 220 13–16-year-old boys and girls examined their motivation for watching slasher movies ( Johnston, 1995 ). Reasons for watching included gore watching, thrill watching, an increased feeling of independence bravery, and problem avoidance. Thrill watching and independence were positively related to positive affect; positive views of slashers were associated with high gore and thrill watching and gore watching predicted preference for graphic violence. Boys were more likely to watch graphic horror because they were motivated to seek out gore, and they were also more likely to identify with the killer than were girls; girls were more likely to identify with the victim. A larger survey of 6,522 10–14-year-old US adolescents in 2003 found similar sex differences: watching violent films was associated with being male, older, non-white, having less educated parents, and having poor school achievement ( Worth et al., 2008 ); teenage boys in another study who were regarded as aggressive and excitable found violent cartoons to be as funny or thrilling ( Aluja-Fabregat and Torrubia-Beltri, 1998 ). Both boys and girls who found violent cartoons funny and thrilling also scored higher on neuroticism, psychoticism, and sensation seeking.

Aging and Horror Enjoyment

The majority of the research on the development of horror preference and response to horror film has recruited children and adolescents as participants. There is very little research on how horror film and horror media in general are perceived as individual’s age and approach caducity, a paucity that is also reflected in humor research. There is some, but not much, research on how older people respond to horror, and this suggests that the preference for horror declines with age ( Tamborini and Stiff, 1987 ; Hoffner and Levine, 2005 ). Clasen et al. (2019) , for example, found a negative correlation between age and enjoyment of horror media and horror use suggesting that both decline as we age. As Clasen et al. concede, however, their sample was clustered around the 35-year age. The average age of those who agreed that they strongly liked horror media was slightly lower than those who disagreed (33.5 vs. 36.5 years). They also note that since sensation seeking also declines with age, this might explain the reduction in enjoyment and seeking out of horror with increasing age post adolescence.

The literature from developmental research mirrors the findings from that in the adult sex differences research in that boys prefer, and seek out, horrifying/scary material more than do girls. Children tend to express greater fear to different types of stimuli and content depending on the age of the child. There are also differences between boys and girls (and between age groups) in the types of coping strategies they adopt during and after watching frightening television and film material. Cognitive strategies, in particular, have been found to be effective with talking about film content and explaining that “monsters” do not exist or that the characters can actually cause no harm being the most effective.

What Causes Fear?

One of the principal purposes of horror film is to induce fear. The nature of fear and its etiology has a long history in psychology, and various models have been proposed, which have attempted to explain why we become afraid and to what types of stimulus. One model, for example, has proposed that we have evolved a “fear module,” a theoretical construct, which comprises a number of domain-specific programs and which is “preferentially activated … by stimuli that are fear relevant in an evolutionary perspective” ( Öhman and Mineka, 2001 ). Fear, it is argued, motivates us to escape and escape very quickly from potential threat and threats to survival ( Mineka and Öhman, 2002 ). The module has four features: it is selective, it is automatic (when encountering fear-relevant stimuli, it responds without mediation), it is encapsulated (i.e., it relies on proven strategies to deal with threat), and it is underpinned by specific neural behavior ( Öhman and Mineka, 2001 ). It is considered to be an adaptive mechanism for allowing us to avoid physical danger rapidly ( Schaller and Neuberg, 2012 ). In the context of horror film, this is, of course, counter-intuitive as horror film viewers who enjoy horror may not wish to escape the horror and deliberately and proactively approach and seek it, and those that do not enjoy horror and who may serendipitously watch horror engage in other withdrawal behaviors such as shutting the eyes or holding on to a companion (they may also leave a cinema or turn off a screen). What occurs during horror film viewing is the willing acceptance that the film will induce fear and that a contract is reached between the medium’s manufacturer and the viewer that this is what is to be expected. The questions that then arise are whether there are specific stimuli or situations, which horror films deploy or recruit which are more likely to induce a fear response and, if so, what are these stimuli and why do they have this effect.

Mineka and Ohman’s conceptualization draws on the (controversial) notion that there are some stimuli to which we are evolutionarily predisposed to fear – that evolution has rendered us more afraid of some objects and situations – and there are stimuli to which we have become socially or cognitively conditioned to fear (e.g., examinations, being in objectively non-threatening social groups). The latter stimuli pose no immediate and real physical threat to survival (i.e., they are not fatal), but the former may potentially present this threat by endangering or causing death, may generate threat, and, therefore, make us more alert to our environment, and these stimuli and situations were experienced by “pre-technological” humans ( Seligman, 1971 ). These stimuli and situations were those which once posed threats to our ancestors and that we, therefore, developed an evolutionary disposition to avoid or to respond with fear, a form of selective association. Guns, for example, are not fatal unless used, and our exposure to them is limited; guns are not phobic stimuli and seeing photographs of guns – or seeing guns – does not elicit significant fear, and not the degree of fear that stimuli to which we are evolutionarily predisposed to fear evoke. A person pointing a gun at us, however, with the intention to fire or with the threat of the intention to fire is clearly a direct threat but not one that is evolutionarily created.

One of most common phobias is arachnophobia, and spiders have been a staple of horror films since the 1950s, although only 0.1–0.3% of spider species are venomous ( Gerdes et al., 2009 ) and conditioned fear to spiders is very difficult to extinguish ( Davey, 1994 ). Individuals are faster at detecting images of spiders and snakes among innocuous stimuli than they are innocuous stimuli placed in an array of threatening stimuli ( Öhman et al., 2001 ). This predisposition facilitates vigilance (occasionally, over-vigilance and we see threat in ambiguous situations) to sources of threat or danger with greater attention paid to some stimuli ( Clasen, 2014 ; March et al., 2017 ). It is a self-protection and survival-enabling mechanism motivating us to confront (and, therefore, remove the potential source of threat) or flee (thereby, removing us from the context in which a threat could result in endangerment).

Fear is related to expressions of disgust, and the literature on phobia suggests that the strength of fear for phobic objects is closely related to disgust sensitivity but not trait anxiety ( Davey, 1994 ) such that people who express abnormal fear of an object also show high degrees of sensitivity to disgusting stimuli but are not dispositionally, highly anxious. A specific phobia, which appears to be qualitatively and quantitatively different from others and is relevant in the context of horror film, is the fear of blood or blood-injection-injury phobia ( Wani et al., 2014 ; Brinkmann et al., 2017 ). This accounts for 3–4% of phobias and is characterized by fear of blood withdrawal, medical intervention, and seeing others’ blood ( Brinkmann et al., 2017 ). Vasovagal syncope (fainting due to low blood pressure and heart rate caused by exposure to a stimulus) is seen in 75% of phobic individuals – there is a short increase followed by a decrease in heart rate. Individuals experience fear, anxiety, and disgust and avoid or decline medical treatment because of the strength of their phobic reaction ( Wani et al., 2014 ). This extreme experience may explain why some people feel squeamish at the sight of blood in horror: blood is unique as a stimulus, which evokes a strong fear or disgust reaction.

Neuropsychology and Horror Film

Fear is the most widely studied emotion in science because it can be easily conditioned, studied, and observed in non-human organisms. There is a substantial literature, which has attempted to explain fear conditioning and learning through reference to its underlying neuropsychology, and much of this work has been conducted on non-human species ( LeDoux and Hofmann, 2018 ). In humans, much of our understanding of the neurology of fear has derived from neuroimaging research and studies of brain injury. One of the brain regions involved in fear recognition and experience is the amygdala ( Martin, 2008 ; March et al., 2017 ), and a considerable literature exists examining the role of this structure in the conditioning and maintenance of fear.

No study has specifically examined the effect of exposure to horror film on brain activation, although hundreds of studies have examined the effect of exposure of fear-related stimuli, including films designed to induce fear, on brain activation measured via MEG, PET, fMRI, and EEG. Many studies have examined the consequence of brain injury on the fear response, and one study is especially relevant to horror film as it examined the effect of bilateral amygdala injury on responses to fear-related stimuli in a film-related context ( Feinstein et al., 2011 ).

In this study, a 44-year-old woman with normal IQ and language showed impaired fear conditioning, impaired recognition of fear in faces, and impaired social-related fear. Feinstein et al. attempted to induce fear by taking her to the pet shop where there were snakes and spiders, walking her through a haunted house, and having her watch horror films. Although she verbally indicated avoidance of the spiders she physically approached them and asked 15 times if she could touch one; at the haunted house (a visitor attraction), she volunteered to lead a group of visitors, did not hesitate in walking around, and was not scared by the monsters (she scared the actors). None of the 10 horror film clips elicited fear (other film clips designed to elicit other emotions successfully elicited those emotions) and she asked for the name of one so that she could rent it. She recognized that most people would be scared by them. This is only comprehensive study of the effect of region-relevant brain injury on the perception of horror films and horror-related stimuli in a single-case study, and while single case studies need to be interpreted cautiously, the study does provide the opening for other studies to confirm the role of these structures in horror appreciation. One possible extension of this study would be to examine whether amygdala reactivity is associated with enjoyment of horror film (those with highly reactive amygdalae may fear or enjoy horror more than those with less reactive amygdalae) or whether the amygdala becomes increasingly active with greater stimulation, and the intensity of the experience correlates with the increase in activity while watching.

Conclusions

The current review sought to determine why people watch horror film and how exposure to horror film affects behavior. Based on the literature from various disciplines, the following conclusions can be reached: (1) low empathy and fearfulness are associated with more enjoyment and desire to watch horror; (2) specific dimensions of empathy are better predictors of people’s responses than are others, but these dimensions are inconsistently predictive; (3) empathetic concern and personal distress are negatively correlated with enjoyment of horror involving torture; (4) there is a positive relationship between sensation seeking and horror enjoyment/preference, but this relationship is not consistent and may depend on the component of sensation seeking; (5) men and boys prefer to watch – and enjoy and seek out – horror more than do women and girls; (6) women and girls report experiencing more fear and anxiety generally than do men and express greater anxiety and fear when watching horror than do boys and men; (7) this sex difference may be attributable to women’s typical higher disgust sensitivity and anxiety proneness (both of which are inter-related); (8) women report more empathetic concern than do men, and this may be another explanatory mechanism; (9) no study to date has systematically explored disgust sensitivity as a mediator in horror enjoyment and preference, but the evidence would suggest that the former will predict the latter; (10) older children are more afraid of concrete objects/stimuli when very young but of symbolic stimuli when younger; (11) individuals tend to prefer horror less as they age, but there is little literature on this topic; (12) children use various coping strategies to overcome horror film-related fear and the success of these depends on the age of the child; (13) physical coping strategies are more successful in younger children; (14) priming with information about the feared object helps reduce fear and increase enjoyment when children watch a film featuring the feared stimulus; (15) the startle reflex is amplified in the presence of threatening stimuli; and (16) little is understood about the role of neuropsychology in the response to horror film generally although the understanding of the structures and regions of the brain implicated in fear and fear conditioning is well documented; the amygdala is likely to be involved in the reaction to (and enjoyment of) horror.

Limitations and Future Directions

The conclusions in the previous paragraph are based on a very limited set of data. The studies from which such data have been drawn have varied in sample size, methodology, and materials, and these are three clearly identifiable and major limitations in this field. Hoffner and Levine (2005) have highlighted similar limitations in their meta-analysis. The type and selection of stimuli used in behavioral studies of horror film and researchers’ definition of what constitutes a “horror” or “graphic” horror film has led to a literature, which renders making generalizations about horror’s effects difficult, the summary above notwithstanding. Studies have used a variety – although a very restricted variety – of horror films over 30 years of research, and the films share little in common apart from being classed as horror film. The Silence of the Lambs, Cannibal Holocaust, The Babadook, Saw, The Blair Witch Project, Psycho, Dracula , and The Devil Rides Out are all horror films, but each has distinctive mechanisms of evoking fear and disgust based on story, film making, plot, characters, sound, performance, visual effects, credibility, and use of music. No one study can fully take into account our response to horror because not all horror films are the same ( Oliver, 1993a , b ), and this limitation needs to be more clearly recognized and addressed in future work.

Hoffner and Levine (2005) have concluded that the nature of the media content in these studies can explain the failure to find homogeneity in the correlations between enjoyment of horror media and empathic concern in their meta-analysis. As noted earlier, when correlations were found for empathy and horror enjoyment, the most consistent correlations found were in those studies in which victimization formed the dominant aspect of the horror stimuli. When these studies were removed, the correlations for the remaining studies fell to almost zero. These studies measured participants’ responses to the enjoyment of horror film as a genre (or response to a drama with a likeable victim), rather than their responses to specific horror films or their experience of watching specific horror films. Hoffner and Levine’s analysis identifies at least two limitations in the field noted here: the heterogeneity of the material used as stimuli in experiments, and the nature of the question asked in these studies (for example, whether the question is: do you enjoy this specific film/film clip? or Do you enjoy this genre of film?). The former limitation can be easily resolved via empirical research. Studies, for example, might examine the role of the nature of the character, the narrative drive of a film (point of view), the esthetics of the film, a film’s use of music, the number acts of violence, and the types of acts of graphic violence and the perpetrator of the violence, the characteristics of the perpetrator, and the victim (their attractiveness, age and sex, for example), a film’s use of color and the use of specific tropes and techniques (such as found-footage and types of horror film). This is not to say that some of these elements have not been studied – this review and others have described studies in which they have – but there has been little research which has examined these elements systematically and methodically, and some elements have not been explored at all.

The issue of self-report – and self-report based on very small samples – is another possible limitation in that authors rely on individuals’ subjective reports based on their impressions and perceptions, and these reports are based on responses to standard questionnaires or questionnaires developed by the authors. This is an issue for any research, which aims to determine how people think and feel and is currently the most effective way of measuring people’s responses. It is possible to study non-verbal measures (such as movement, EEG, brain activation, GSR, and so on), but these are indirect, correlational measures of what an individual might be thinking or feeling. Motor behavior, however, may be a very informative indicator of response to horror, as some of the studies reviewed here suggest.

Given the current accessibility of film and media generally via smartphones, as well as internet-ready TVs and, of course, computers, one topic of research that has been little studied is whether the medium affects the perception and enjoyment of horror films. Filmmakers may bemoan the viewing of material on a smartphone that was designed for a screen that is 1,000 times larger, but it would be instructive to examine whether screen size affects people’s esthetic, emotional, and cognitive response to horror. Screen size and its effect on the enjoyment of displayed material have been relatively well-studied (see, for example, Grabe et al., 1999 ; Lombard et al., 2000 ; Rigby et al., 2016 ). In the context of horror, however, it is hypothesizable that increased screen size leads to increased visibility and that this would result in a stronger fright reaction because more of the horror can be seen and seen more clearly. It is also possible that the augmentation of the screen would also augment the sound (an auditory-sound illusion) so that bigger screens might affect our perception of horror because of this visual illusion.

There is also scope for further research on coping with the effects of watching horror film and of mitigating the fright if the experience is considered too intense or too unmanageable. Of course, individuals could choose not to watch or could chose to watch selectively if they are in front of the screen. But there may be more imaginative strategies that might be adopted such as the introduction of non-visual, non-verbal, and non-auditory stimuli (e.g., scent). It is possible that the presence of a pleasant scent might alleviate some of the fright generated by horror film if such alleviation is required (either because it distracts or because it creates or elevates positive mood). There is some evidence that this might be possible ( Martin, 2013 ), and this is a question that merits pursuit. Wes Craven’s film, The Last House On The Left , utilized a similar, if non-olfactory distraction technique in the tagline for the film, which was “Keep repeating, it’s only a film…it’s only a film…”

The majority of the studies reviewed here has included mono-cultural samples, and the current review was unable to uncover any cross-cultural research on horror enjoyment or preference. An understanding of the cultural influences on film preference (especially horror) and the individual differences that may underpin them warrants investigation given that certain genres of horror appear to be more popular and appear more often, in specific cultures: Different cultures place different emphases on certain types of content and Japanese horror with its emphasis on ghosts, the supernatural is an obvious example ( Balmain, 2008 ; McRoy, 2008 ). Others have argued that the European horror film is distinct from other types of horror film and has a specific “esthetic” ( Allmer et al., 2012 ). There is a considerable literature on the difference between collectivistic and individualistic cultures with research suggesting that the psychological responses of individuals from each type of cultural background are different ( Matsumoto et al., 2008 ; Alotaibi et al., 2017 ; Gendron, 2017 ). In the field of horror film perception, experience, and enjoyment, it could be hypothesized that individuals from collectivistic cultures might respond differently to horror (and victims in horror) than do individuals from individualistic cultures – specifically individuals from collectivistic cultures may express greater fear compared to those from individualistic cultures – and this is an hypothesis that can be easily tested.

With interest and appreciation in horror increasing, the scope for undertaking research into horror film has never been more timely. There is still much to discover and still much to understand. Horror, said Adorno in another context, was beyond the scope of psychology. The research would suggest that the weight of evidence is on the side of one of horror’s innovators. Without psychology, Dario Argento once said, the horror film does not exist.

Author Contributions

The author confirms being the sole contributor of this work and has approved it for publication.

Conflict of Interest

The author declares that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Acknowledgments

The author would like to thank Dr Charlie Allbright, Phil Hughes, and four reviewers, especially reviewer 2, for their detailed and thoughtful comments on earlier drafts of this paper, and to Edward Lionheart for planting the seed for this review.

Allmer, P., Brick, E., and Huxley, D. (2012). “Section introduction” in European nightmares: Horror cinema in Europe since 1945 . eds. P. Allmer, E. Brick, and D. Huxley (NY: Columbia University Press).

Google Scholar

Alotaibi, A., Underwood, G., and Smith, A. D. (2017). Cultural differences in attention: eye movement evidence from a comparative visual search task. Conscious. Cogn. 55, 254–265. doi: 10.1016/j.concog.2017.09.002

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

Al-Shawaf, L., Lewis, D. M., and Buss, D. M. (2018). Sex differences in disgust: why are women more easily disgusted than men? Emot. Rev. 10, 149–160. doi: 10.1177/1754073917709940

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

Aluja-Fabregat, A. (2000). Personality and curiosity about TV and films violence in adolescents. Personal. Individ. Differ. 29, 379–392. doi: 10.1016/S0191-8869(99)00200-7

Aluja-Fabregat, A., and Torrubia-Beltri, R. (1998). Viewing of mass media violence, perception of violence, personality and academic achievement. Personal. Individ. Differ. 25, 973–989. doi: 10.1016/S0191-8869(98)00122-6

Angrilli, A., Mauri, A., Palomba, D., Flor, H., Birbaumer, N., Sartori, G., et al. (1996). Startle reflex and emotion modulation impairment after a right amygdala lesion. Brain 119, 1991–2004. doi: 10.1093/brain/119.6.1991

Arrindell, W. A., Eisemann, M., Oei, T. P., Caballo, V. E., Sanavio, E., Sica, C., et al. (2004). Phobic anxiety in 11 nations: part II. Hofstede’s dimensions of national cultures predict national-level variations. Personal. Individ. Differ. 37, 627–643. doi: 10.1016/j.paid.2003.11.002

Baird, R. (2000). The startle effect. Film Q. 53, 12–24. doi: 10.2307/1213732

Ballon, B., and Leszcz, M. (2007). Horror films: tales to master terror or shapers of trauma? Am. J. Psychother. 61, 211–230. doi: 10.1176/appi.psychotherapy.2007.61.2.211

Balmain, C. (2008). Introduction to Japanese horror film . Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.

Bartsch, A., Appel, M., and Storch, D. (2010). Predicting emotions and meta-emotions at the movies: the role of the need for affect in audiences’ experience of horror and drama. Commun. Res. 37, 167–190. doi: 10.1177/0093650209356441

Batson, C. D. (1987). “Prosocial motivation: Is it ever truly altruistic?” in Advances in experimental social psychology , vol. 20 (Academic Press), 65–122.

Bauer, D. H. (1976). An exploratory study of developmental changes in children’s fears. J. Child Psychol. Psychiatry 17, 69–74. doi: 10.1111/j.1469-7610.1976.tb00375.x

Berlyne, D. E. (1967). “Arousal and reinforcement” in Nebraska symposium on motivation. Nebraska: University of Nebraska Press.

Berry, M., Gray, T., and Donnerstein, E. (1999). Cutting film violence: effects on perceptions, enjoyment, and arousal. J. Soc. Psychol. 139, 567–582. doi: 10.1080/00224549909598417

Blood, A. J., Zatorre, R. J., Bermudez, P., and Evans, A. C. (1999). Emotional responses to pleasant and unpleasant music correlate with activity in paralimbic brain regions. Nat. Neurosci. 2, 382–387. doi: 10.1038/7299

Bozzuto, J. C. (1975). Cinematic neurosis following “the exorcist”: report of four cases. J. Nerv. Ment. Dis. 161, 43–48.

Bradley, M. M., Cuthbert, B. N., and Lang, P. J. (1999). “Affect and the startle reflex” in Startle modification: Implications for neuroscience, cognitive science, and clinical science . eds. M. E. Dawson, A. M. Schell, and A. H. Bohmelt (Cambridge: CUP), 157–183.

Bradley, M. M., Moulder, B., and Lang, P. J. (2005). When good things go bad: the reflex physiology of defense. Psychol. Sci. 16, 468–473. doi: 10.1111/j.0956-7976.2005.01558.x

Bradley, M. M., Zlatar, Z. Z., and Lang, P. J. (2018). Startle reflex modulation during threat of shock and “threat” of reward. Psychophysiology 55:e12989. doi: 10.1111/psyp.12989

Brinkmann, L., Poller, H., Herrmann, M. J., Miltner, W., and Straube, T. (2017). Initial and sustained brain responses to threat anticipation in blood-injection-injury phobia. NeuroImage Clin. 13, 320–329. doi: 10.1016/j.nicl.2016.12.015

Bublatzky, F., Guerra, P. M., Pastor, M. C., Schupp, H. T., and Vila, J. (2013). Additive effects of threat-of-shock and picture valence on startle reflex modulation. PLoS One 8:e54003. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0054003

Bullerjahn, C., and Güldenring, M. (1994). An empirical investigation of effects of film music using qualitative content analysis. Psychomusicol. J. Res. Music Cogn. 13:99.

Cairns, D. (2015). The horror and the pity: Phrikē as a tragic emotion. Psychoanal. Inq. 35, 75–94. doi: 10.1080/07351690.2014.957137

Cantador, I., Fernández-Tobías, I., and Bellogín, A. (2013). “Relating personality types with user preferences in multiple entertainment domains” in UMAP 2013: Extended proceedings late-breaking results, project papers and workshop proceedings of the 21st conference on user modelling, adaptation, and personalization. CEUR workshop proceedings. Vol. 997.

Cantor, J. (2004). “I’ll never have a clown in my house”—Why movie horror lives on. Poetics Today 25, 283–304. doi: 10.1215/03335372-25-2-283

Cantor, J., Byrne, S., Moyer-Gusé, E., and Riddle, K. (2010). Descriptions of media-induced fright reactions in a sample of US elementary school children. J. Child. Media 4, 1–17. doi: 10.1080/17482790903407242

Cantor, J., and Hoffner, C. (1990). Children’s fear reactions to a televised film as a function of perceived immediacy of depicted threat. J. Broadcast. Electron. Media 34, 421–442. doi: 10.1080/08838159009386753

Cantor, J., and Reilly, S. (1982). Adolescents’ fright reactions to television and films. J. Commun. 32, 87–99. doi: 10.1111/j.1460-2466.1982.tb00480.x

Cantor, J., and Sparks, G. G. (1984). Children’s fear responses to mass media: testing some Piagetian predictions. J. Commun. 34, 90–103. doi: 10.1111/j.1460-2466.1984.tb02162.x

Cantor, J., Sparks, G. G., and Hoffner, C. (1988). Calming children’s television fears: Mr. Rogers vs. the incredible hulk. J. Broadcast. Electron. Media 32, 271–288. doi: 10.1080/08838158809386702

Cantor, J., and Wilson, B. J. (1984). Modifying fear responses to mass media in preschool and elementary school children. J. Broadcast. 28, 431–443.

Cantor, J., and Wilson, B. J. (1988). Helping children cope with frightening media presentations. Curr. Psychol. 7, 58–75. doi: 10.1007/BF02686664

Cantor, J., Wilson, B. J., and Hoffner, C. (1986). Emotional responses to a televised nuclear holocaust film. Commun. Res. 13, 257–277.

Cantor, J., Ziemke, D., and Sparks, G. G. (1984). Effect of forewarning on emotional responses to a horror film. J. Broadcast. 28, 21–31.

Carroll, N. (1987). The nature of horror. J. Aesthet. Art Critic. 46, 51–59. doi: 10.2307/431308

Carroll, N. (2003). The philosophy of horror: Or, paradoxes of the heart . London: Routledge.

Cherry, B. (2009). Horror . London: Routledge.

Chory, R. M., and Goodboy, A. K. (2011). Is basic personality related to violent and non-violent video game play and preferences? Cyberpsychol. Behav. Soc. Netw. 14, 191–198. doi: 10.1089/cyber.2010.0076

Clasen, M. (2014). “Evil monsters in horror fiction: an evolutionary perspective on form and function” in A history of evil in popular culture: What Hannibal Lecter, Stephen King and vampires reveal about America . Vol. 2. eds. S. Packer and J. Pennington (Santa Barbara, California: ABC-CLIO/Praeger), 39–47.

Clasen, M., Christiansen, J. K., and Johnson, J. A. (2019). Horror, personality, and threat simulation. Evol. Behav. Sci. (in press).

Connolly, K. M., Olatunji, B. O., and Lohr, J. M. (2008). Evidence for disgust sensitivity mediating the sex differences found in blood-injection-injury phobia and spider phobia. Personal. Individ. Differ. 44, 898–908. doi: 10.1016/j.paid.2007.10.020

Cook, E. W., Hawk, L. W., Davis, T. L., and Stevenson, V. E. (1991). Affective individual differences and startle reflex modulation. J. Abnorm. Psychol. 100, 5–15. doi: 10.1037/0021-843X.100.1.5

Cowan, G., and O’Brien, M. (1990). Gender and survival vs. death in slasher films: a content analysis. Sex Roles 23, 187–196. doi: 10.1007/BF00289865

Davey, G. C. (1994). Self-reported fears to common indigenous animals in an adult UK population: the role of disgust sensitivity. Br. J. Psychol. 85, 541–554. doi: 10.1111/j.2044-8295.1994.tb02540.x

Davis, M. H. (1983). Measuring individual differences in empathy: evidence for a multidimensional approach. J. Pers. Soc. Psychol. 44, 113–126. doi: 10.1037/0022-3514.44.1.113

Davis, M. (2006). Neural systems involved in fear and anxiety measured with fear-potentiated startle. Am. Psychol. 61, 741–756. doi: 10.1037/0003-066X.61.8.741

Davis, M. H., and Kraus, L. A. (1997). “Personality and empathic accuracy” in Empathic accuracy . ed. W. J. Ickes (New York: Guildford Press), 144–168.

Davydov, D. M., Luminet, O., and Zech, E. (2013). An externally oriented style of thinking as a moderator of responses to affective films in women. Int. J. Psychophysiol. 87, 152–164. doi: 10.1016/j.ijpsycho.2012.12.003

Edwards, E. D. (1984). The relationship between sensation-seeking and horror movie interest and attendance. doctoral dissertation. Knoxville: University of Tennessee.

Englund, R. (2009). Hollywood monster . London: Aurum.

Etchison, D. (2011). “Foreword” in Nightmare movies: Horror on screen since the 1960s . ed. K. Newman (London: Bloomsbury Publishing).

Fanti, K. A., Kyranides, M. N., and Panayiotou, G. (2017). Facial reactions to violent and comedy films: association with callous–unemotional traits and impulsive aggression. Cognit. Emot. 31, 209–224. doi: 10.1080/02699931.2015.1090958

Feinstein, J. S., Adolphs, R., Damasio, A., and Tranel, D. (2011). The human amygdala and the induction and experience of fear. Curr. Biol. 21, 34–38. doi: 10.1016/j.cub.2010.11.042

Franken, R. E., Gibson, K. J., and Rowland, G. L. (1992). Sensation seeking and the tendency to view the world as threatening. Personal. Individ. Differ. 13, 31–38. doi: 10.1016/0191-8869(92)90214-A

Frayling, C. (2013). Mad, bad and dangerous?: The scientist and the cinema . London: Reaktion books.

Freud, S. (1919/1971). The uncanny. Transl. By James Strachey . London: Hogarth.

Freud, S. (1919/2003). The uncanny . London: Penguin.

Gaut, B. (1993). “The paradox of horror” in Arguing about art: Contemporary philosophical debates . eds. A. Neill and A. Ridley (Oxford: Routledge) 317–329.

Gendron, M. (2017). Revisiting diversity: cultural variation reveals the constructed nature of emotion perception. Curr. Opin. Psychol. 17, 145–150. doi: 10.1016/j.copsyc.2017.07.014

Gerdes, A. B., Uhl, G., and Alpers, G. W. (2009). Spiders are special: fear and disgust evoked by pictures of arthropods. Evol. Hum. Behav. 30, 66–73. doi: 10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2008.08.005

Gorbman, C. (1987). Unheard melodies: Narrative film music . USA: Indiana University Press.

Grabe, M. E., Lombard, M., Reich, R. D., Bracken, C. C., and Ditton, T. B. (1999). The role of screen size in viewer experiences of media content. Vis. Commun. Q. 6, 4–9. doi: 10.1080/15551399909363403

Greene, K., and Krcmar, M. (2005). Predicting exposure to and liking of media violence: a uses and gratifications approach. Commun. Stud. 56, 71–93. doi: 10.1080/0008957042000332250

Grillon, C., Ameli, R., Foot, M., and Davis, M. (1993a). Fear-potentiated startle: relationship to the level of state/trait anxiety in healthy subjects. Biol. Psychiatry 33, 566–574. doi: 10.1016/0006-3223(93)90094-T

Grillon, C., Ameli, R., Merikangas, K., Woods, S. W., and Davis, M. (1993b). Measuring the time course of anticipatory anxiety using the fear-potentiated startle reflex. Psychophysiology 30, 340–346. doi: 10.1111/j.1469-8986.1993.tb02055.x

Hagenaars, M. A., Roelofs, K., and Stins, J. F. (2014). Human freezing in response to affective films. Anxiety Stress Coping 27, 27–37. doi: 10.1080/10615806.2013.809420

Hall, A. E., and Bracken, C. C. (2011). I really liked that movie. J. media Psychol. 23, 90–99. doi: 10.1027/1864-1105/a000036

Hanich, J. (2011). Cinematic emotion in horror films and thrillers: the aesthetic paradox of pleasurable fear . London: Routledge.

Hantke, S. (Ed.) (2004). Horror film: creating and marketing fear . Mississippi: University Press of Mississippi.

Hamilton, J. W. (1978). Cinematic neurosis: a brief case report. J. Am. Acad. Psychoanal. 6, 569–572. doi: 10.1521/jaap.1.1978.6.4.569

Harris, R. J., Hoekstra, S. J., Scott, C. L., Sanborn, F. W., Karafa, J. A., and Brandenburg, J. D. (2000). Young men’s and women’s different autobiographical memories of the experience of seeing frightening movies on a date. Media Psychol. 2, 245–268. doi: 10.1207/S1532785XMEP0203_3

Harrison, K., and Cantor, J. (1999). Tales from the screen: enduring fright reactions to scary media. Media Psychol. 1, 97–116. doi: 10.1207/s1532785xmep0102_1

Hayward, P. (2009). Terror tracks . London: Equinox.

Hitchcock, J., and Davis, M. (1986). Lesions of the amygdala, but not of the cerebellum or red nucleus, block conditioned fear as measured with the potentiated startle paradigm. Behav. Neurosci. 100, 11–22. doi: 10.1037/0735-7044.100.1.11

Hoekstra, S. J., Harris, R. J., and Helmick, A. L. (1999). Autobiographical memories about the experience of seeing frightening movies in childhood. Media Psychol. 1, 117–140. doi: 10.1207/s1532785xmep0102_2

Hoffner, C. (1995). Adolescents’ coping with frightening mass media. Commun. Res. 22, 325–346.

Hoffner, C. (1997). Children’s emotional reactions to a scary film: the role of prior outcome information and coping style. Hum. Commun. Res. 23, 323–341. doi: 10.1111/j.1468-2958.1997.tb00399.x

Hoffner, C. (2009). Affective responses and exposure to frightening films: the role of empathy and different types of content. Commun. Res. Rep. 26, 285–296. doi: 10.1080/08824090903293700

Hoffner, C., and Cantor, J. (1990). Forewarning of a threat and prior knowledge of outcome: effects on children’s emotional responses to a film sequence. Hum. Commun. Res. 16, 323–354. doi: 10.1111/j.1468-2958.1990.tb00214.x

Hoffner, C., and Cantor, J. (1991). Factors affecting children’s enjoyment of a frightening film sequence. Commun. Monogr. 58, 41–62. doi: 10.1080/03637759109376213

Hoffner, C. A., and Levine, K. J. (2005). Enjoyment of mediated fright and violence: a meta-analysis. Media Psychol. 7, 207–237. doi: 10.1207/S1532785XMEP0702_5

Horowitz, M., and Wilner, N. (1976). Stress films, emotion, and cognitive response. Arch. Gen. Psychiatry 33, 1339–1344. doi: 10.1001/archpsyc.1976.01770110067006

Hume, D. (1907). Essays: Moral, political, and literary. Vol. 1 . Harlow: Longmans.

Hyson, M. C. (1979). Lobster on the sidewalk: understanding and helping children with fears. Young Child. 34, 54–60.

Jansen, D. M., and Frijda, N. H. (1994). Modulation of the acoustic startle response by film-induced fear and sexual arousal. Psychophysiology 31, 565–571. doi: 10.1111/j.1469-8986.1994.tb02349.x

Johnson, B. R. (1980). General occurrence of stressful reactions to commercial motion pictures and elements in films subjectively identified as stressors. Psychol. Rep. 47, 775–786.

Johnson, B. K., Udvardi, A., Eden, A., and Rosenbaum, J. E. (2019). Spoilers go bump in the night: impacts of minor and major reveals on horror film enjoyment. J. Media Psychol. (in press). doi: 10.1027/1864-1105/a000252

Johnston, D. D. (1995). Adolescents’ motivations for viewing graphic horror. Hum. Commun. Res. 21, 522–552. doi: 10.1111/j.1468-2958.1995.tb00357.x

Katz, E., Blumler, J. G., and Gurevitch, M. (1973). Uses and gratifications research. Public Opin. Q. 37, 509–523. doi: 10.1086/268109

Kawin, B. F. (2012). Horror and the horror film . London: Anthem Press.

Kessler, R. C., McGonagle, K. A., Zhao, S., Nelson, C. B., Hughes, M., Eshleman, S., et al. (1994). Lifetime and 12-month prevalence of DSM-III-R psychiatric disorders in the United States: results from the National Comorbidity Survey. Arch. Gen. Psychiatry 51, 8–19. doi: 10.1001/archpsyc.1994.03950010008002

King, S. (2010). Danse macabre . New York: Simon and Schuster.

King, C. M., and Hourani, N. (2007). Don’t tease me: effects of ending type on horror film enjoyment. Media Psychol. 9, 473–492. doi: 10.1080/15213260701282915

Kjeldgaard-Christiansen, J. (2016). Evil origins: a Darwinian genealogy of the popcultural villain. Evol. Behav. Sci. 10, 109–122. doi: 10.1037/ebs0000057

Koukounas, E., and McCabe, M. P. (2001). Emotional responses to filmed violence and the eye blink startle response: a preliminary investigation. J. Interpers. Violence 16, 476–488. doi: 10.1177/088626001016005006

Kreibig, S. D., Wilhelm, F. H., Roth, W. T., and Gross, J. J. (2011). Affective modulation of the acoustic startle: does sadness engage the defensive system? Biol. Psychol. 87, 161–163. doi: 10.1016/j.biopsycho.2011.02.008

Krusemark, E. A., and Li, W. (2011). Do all threats work the same way? Divergent effects of fear and disgust on sensory perception and attention. J. Neurosci. 31, 3429–3434. doi: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.4394-10.2011

LeDoux, J. E., and Hofmann, S. G. (2018). The subjective experience of emotion: a fearful view. Curr. Opin. Behav. Sci. 19, 67–72. doi: 10.1016/j.cobeha.2017.09.011

Lehne, M., and Koelsch, S. (2015). Toward a general psychological model of tension and suspense. Front. Psychol. 6:79. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00079

Lerner, N. (2010). “Preface: listening to fear/listening with fear” in Music in the horror film: Listening to fear . London: Routledge.

Lissek, S., and Powers, A. S. (2003). Sensation seeking and startle modulation by physically threatening images. Biol. Psychol. 63, 179–197. doi: 10.1016/S0301-0511(03)00053-X

Lombard, M., Reich, R. D., Grabe, M. E., Bracken, C. C., and Ditton, T. B. (2000). Presence and television. The role of screen size. Hum. Commun. Res. 26, 75–98. doi: 10.1111/j.1468-2958.2000.tb00750.x

Lynch, T., and Martins, N. (2015). Nothing to fear? An analysis of college students’ fear experiences with video games. J. Broadcast. Electron. Media 59, 298–317. doi: 10.1080/08838151.2015.1029128

Madsen, K. E. (2016). The differential effects of agency on fear induction using a horror-themed video game. Comput. Hum. Behav. 56, 142–146. doi: 10.1016/j.chb.2015.11.041

Maffei, A., Vencato, V., and Angrilli, A. (2015). Sex differences in emotional evaluation of film clips: interaction with five high arousal emotional categories. PLoS One 10:e0145562. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0145562

Maio, G. R., and Esses, V. M. (2001). The need for affect: individual differences in the motivation to approach or avoid emotions. J. Pers. 69, 583–614. doi: 10.1111/1467-6494.694156

March, D. S., Gaertner, L., and Olson, M. A. (2017). In harm’s way: on preferential response to threatening stimuli. Personal. Soc. Psychol. Bull. 43, 1519–1529. doi: 10.1177/0146167217722558

Marriott, J. (2012). Horror films . London: Random House.

Martin, G. N. (2008). Human neuropsychology. 2nd Edn. Harlow: Pearson education.

Martin, G. N. (2013). The neuropsychology of smell and taste . London: Psychology Press.

Mathai, J. (1983). An acute anxiety state in an adolescent precipitated by viewing a horror movie. J. Adolesc. 6, 197–200. doi: 10.1016/S0140-1971(83)80027-X

Matsumoto, D., Yoo, S. H., and Fontaine, J. (2008). Mapping expressive differences around the world: the relationship between emotional display rules and individualism versus collectivism. J. Cross-Cult. Psychol. 39, 55–74. doi: 10.1177/0022022107311854

McLean, C. P., and Anderson, E. R. (2009). Brave men and timid women? A review of the gender differences in fear and anxiety. Clin. Psychol. Rev. 29, 496–505. doi: 10.1016/j.cpr.2009.05.003

McRoy, J. (2008). Nightmare Japan: Contemporary Japanese horror cinema . Amsterdam: Rodopi.

Mineka, S., and Öhman, A. (2002). Phobias and preparedness: the selective, automatic, and encapsulated nature of fear. Biol. Psychiatry 52, 927–937. doi: 10.1016/S0006-3223(02)01669-4

Mortensen, C. R., Becker, D. V., Ackerman, J. M., Neuberg, S. L., and Kenrick, D. T. (2010). Infection breeds reticence: the effects of disease salience on self-perceptions of personality and behavioral avoidance tendencies. Psychol. Sci. 21, 440–447. doi: 10.1177/0956797610361706

Mundorf, N., Weaver, J., and Zillmann, D. (1989). Effects of gender roles and self perceptions on affective reactions to horror films. Sex Roles 20, 655–673. doi: 10.1007/BF00288078

Neuberg, S. L., Kenrick, D. T., and Schaller, M. (2011). Human threat management systems: self-protection and disease avoidance. Neurosci. Biobehav. Rev. 35, 1042–1051. doi: 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2010.08.011

Neuendorf, K. A., and Sparks, G. G. (1988). Predicting emotional responses to horror films from cue-specific affect. Commun. Q. 36, 16–27. doi: 10.1080/01463378809369704

Newman, K. (2011). Nightmare movies: Horror on screen since the 1960s . London: Bloomsbury Publishing.

Öhman, A., Flykt, A., and Esteves, F. (2001). Emotion drives attention: detecting the snake in the grass. J. Exp. Psychol. Gen. 130, 466–478. doi: 10.1037/0096-3445.130.3.466

Öhman, A., and Mineka, S. (2001). Fears, phobias, and preparedness: toward an evolved module of fear and fear learning. Psychol. Rev. 108, 483–522. doi: 10.1037/0033-295X.108.3.483

Olatunji, B. O., Armstrong, T., and Elwood, L. (2017a). Is disgust proneness associated with anxiety and related disorders? A qualitative review and meta-analysis of group comparison and correlational studies. Perspect. Psychol. Sci. 12, 613–648. doi: 10.1177/1745691616688879

Olatunji, B. O., Berg, H. E., and Zhao, Z. (2017b). Emotion regulation of fear and disgust: differential effects of reappraisal and suppression. Cognit. Emot. 31, 403–410. doi: 10.1080/02699931.2015.1110117

Oliver, M. B. (1993a). Adolescents’ enjoyment of graphic horror: effects of viewers’ attitudes and portrayals of victim. Commun. Res. 20, 30–50.

Oliver, M. B. (1993b). Exploring the paradox of the enjoyment of sad films. Hum. Commun. Res. 19, 315–342.

Oliver, M. B. (1994). Contributions of sexual portrayals to viewers’ responses to graphic horror. J. Broadcast. Electron. Media 38, 1–17. doi: 10.1080/08838159409364242

Oliver, M. B., Weaver, J. B. III, and Sargent, S. L. (2000). An examination of factors related to sex differences in enjoyment of sad films. J. Broadcast. Electron. Media 44, 282–300. doi: 10.1207/s15506878jobem4402_8

Palmer, E. L., Hockett, A. B., and Dean, W. W. (1983). The television family and children’s fright reactions. J. Fam. Issues 4, 279–292.

Palmgreen, P. (1984). Uses and gratifications: a theoretical perspective. Ann. Int. Commun. Assoc. 8, 20–55.

Punter, D. (2014). “The Literature of Terror” in The Gothic Tradition. Vol. 1 (London: Routledge). 121–140.

Reynaud, E., El Khoury-Malhame, M., Rossier, J., Blin, O., and Khalfa, S. (2012). Neuroticism modifies psychophysiological responses to fearful films. PLoS One 7:e32413. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0032413

Rigby, J. M., Brumby, D. P., Cox, A. L., and Gould, S. J. (2016). “Watching movies on netflix: investigating the effect of screen size on viewer immersion” in Proceedings of the 18th international conference on human-computer interaction with mobile devices and services adjunct (ACM), 714–721.

Robinson, J. A., and Barnett, A. (1975). Jaws neurosis. N. Engl. J. Med. 293, 1154–1155. doi: 10.1056/NEJM197511272932224

Roy, M., Mailhot, J. P., Gosselin, N., Paquette, S., and Peretz, I. (2009). Modulation of the startle reflex by pleasant and unpleasant music. Int. J. Psychophysiol. 71, 37–42. doi: 10.1016/j.ijpsycho.2008.07.010

Rubin, A. M. (1994). “Media uses and effects: a uses-and-gratifications perspective” in Media effects: Advances in theory and research . eds. J. Bryant and D. Zillmann (Hillsdale, NJ, US: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc), 417–436.

Schaller, M., and Neuberg, S. L. (2012). “Danger, disease, and the nature of prejudice(s)” in Adv. Exp. soc. psychol. 46, 1–54. doi: 10.1016/B978-0-12-394281-4.00001-5

Seligman, M. E. (1971). Phobias and preparedness. Behav. Ther. 2, 307–320. doi: 10.1016/S0005-7894(71)80064-3

Shanmugarajah, K., Gaind, S., Clarke, A., and Butler, P. E. (2012). The role of disgust emotions in the observer response to facial disfigurement. Body Image 9, 455–461. doi: 10.1016/j.bodyim.2012.05.003

Simons, D., and Silveira, W. R. (1994). Post-traumatic stress disorder in children after television programmes. BMJ 308, 389–390. doi: 10.1136/bmj.308.6925.389

Sipos, T. M. (2010). Horror film aesthetics: Creating the visual language of fear . NC: McFarland & Company.

Sparks, G. G. (1986a). Developmental differences in children’s reports of fear induced by the mass media. Child Study J. 16, 55–66.

Sparks, G. G. (1986b). Developing a scale to assess cognitive responses to frightening films. J. Broadcast. Electron. Media 30, 65–73. doi: 10.1080/08838158609386608

Sparks, G. G. (1989a). Understanding emotional reactions to a suspenseful movie: the interaction between forewarning and preferred coping style. Commun. Monogr. 56, 325–340. doi: 10.1080/03637758909390268

Sparks, G. G. (1989b). The prevalence and intensity of fright reactions to mass media: implications of the activation-arousal view. Commun. Q. 37, 108–117. doi: 10.1080/01463378909385532

Sparks, G. G. (1991). The relationship between distress and delight in males’ and females’ reactions to frightening films. Hum. Commun. Res. 17, 625–637. doi: 10.1111/j.1468-2958.1991.tb00247.x

Sparks, G. G., and Cantor, J. (1986). Developmental differences in fright responses to a television program depicting a character transformation. J. Broadcast. Electron. Media 30, 309–323. doi: 10.1080/08838158609386626

Sparks, G. G., Pellechia, M., and Irvine, C. (1999). The repressive coping style and fright reactions to mass media. Commun. Res. 26, 176–192.

Sparks, G. G., Sherry, J., and Lubsen, G. (2005). The appeal of media violence in a full-length motion picture: an experimental investigation. Commun. Rep. 18, 21–30. doi: 10.1080/08934210500084198

Sparks, G. G., and Spirek, M. M. (1988). Individual differences in coping with stressful mass media: an activation-arousal view. Hum. Commun. Res. 15, 195–216. doi: 10.1111/j.1468-2958.1988.tb00181.x

Sparks, G. G., Spirek, M. M., and Hodgson, K. (1993). Individual differences in arousability: implications for understanding immediate and lingering emotional reactions to frightening mass media. Commun. Q. 41, 465–476. doi: 10.1080/01463379309369906

Stanley, J., and Knight, R. G. (2004). Emotional specificity of startle potentiation during the early stages of picture viewing. Psychophysiology 41, 935–940. doi: 10.1111/j.1469-8986.2004.00242.x

Stone, B. (2016). The sanctification of fear: images of the religious in horror films. J. Religion Film 5:7.

Tamborini, R. (1991). “Responding to horror: determinants of exposure and appeal” in Responding to the screen: Reception and reaction processes . eds. J. Bryant and D. Zillmann (Hillsdale, NJ: LEA), 305–328.

Tamborini, R., Salomonson, K., and Bahk, C. (1993). The relationship of empathy to comforting behavior following film exposure. Commun. Res. 20, 723–738.

Tamborini, R., and Stiff, J. (1987). Predictors of horror film attendance and appeal: an analysis of the audience for frightening films. Commun. Res. 14, 415–436.

Tamborini, R., Stiff, J., and Heidel, C. (1990). Reacting to graphic horror: a model of empathy and emotional behavior. Commun. Res. 17, 616–640.

Tamborini, R., Stiff, J., and Zillmann, D. (1987). Preference for graphic horror featuring male versus female victimization: personality and past film viewing experiences. Hum. Commun. Res. 13, 529–552. doi: 10.1111/j.1468-2958.1987.tb00117.x

Tannenbaum, P. H., and Gaer, E. P. (1965). Mood change as a function of stress of protagonist and degree of identification in a film-viewing situation. J. Pers. Soc. Psychol. 2, 612–616. doi: 10.1037/h0022497

Tucker, M., and Bond, N. W. (1997). The roles of gender, sex role, and disgust in fear of animals. Personal. Individ. Differ. 22, 135–138. doi: 10.1016/S0191-8869(96)00168-7

Tudor, A. (1989). Monsters and mad scientists. Genre 1, 1931–1960.

Tudor, A. (1997). Why horror? The peculiar pleasures of a popular genre. Cult. Stud. 11, 443–463. doi: 10.1080/095023897335691

Turley, J. M., and Derdeyn, A. P. (1990). Case study: use of a horror film in psychotherapy. J. Am. Acad. Child Adolesc. Psychiatry 29, 942–945. doi: 10.1097/00004583-199011000-00018

Twitchell, J. B. (1989). Preposterous violence: Fables of aggression in modern culture . New York: Oxford University Press.

Valkenburg, P. M., Cantor, J., and Peeters, A. L. (2000). Fright reactions to television: a child survey. Commun. Res. 27, 82–99. doi: 10.1177/009365000027001004

Vlahou, C. H., Vanman, E. J., and Morris, M. M. (2011). Emotional reactions while watching graphic medical procedures: vocational differences in the explicit regulation of emotions 1. J. Appl. Soc. Psychol. 41, 2768–2784. doi: 10.1111/j.1559-1816.2011.00839.x

Vrana, S. R., and Lang, P. J. (1990). Fear imagery and the startle-probe reflex. J. Abnorm. Psychol. 99, 189–197. doi: 10.1037/0021-843X.99.2.189

Vrana, S. R., Spence, E. L., and Lang, P. J. (1988). The startle probe response: a new measure of emotion? J. Abnorm. Psychol. 97, 487–491. doi: 10.1037/0021-843X.97.4.487

Wani, A. L., Ara, A., and Bhat, S. A. (2014). Blood injury and injection phobia: the neglected one. Behav. Neurol. 2014:471340. doi: 10.1155/2014/471340

Weaver, A. J. (2011). A meta-analytical review of selective exposure to and the enjoyment of media violence. J. Broadcast. Electron. Media 55, 232–250. doi: 10.1080/08838151.2011.570826

Weaver, J. B. III (1991). Are “slasher” horror films sexually violent? A content analysis. J. Broadcast. Electron. Media 35, 385–392. doi: 10.1080/08838159109364133

Weaver, A. J., and Wilson, B. J. (2009). The role of graphic and sanitised violence in the enjoyment of television dramas. Hum. Commun. Res. 35, 442–463. doi: 10.1111/j.1468-2958.2009.01358.x

Weinberger, D. A. (1990). “The construct validity of the repressive coping style” in Repression and dissociation: Implications for personality theory, psychopathology, and health , 337–386.

Weiss, A. J., Imrich, D. J., and Wilson, B. J. (1993). Prior exposure to creatures from a horror film: live versus photographic representations. Hum. Commun. Res. 20, 41–66. doi: 10.1111/j.1468-2958.1993.tb00315.x

Wilson, B. J. (1987). Reducing children’s emotional reactions to mass media through rehearsed explanation and exposure to a replica of a fear object. Hum. Commun. Res. 14, 3–26. doi: 10.1111/j.1468-2958.1987.tb00119.x

Wilson, B. J. (1989). The effects of two control strategies on children’s emotional reactions to a frightening movie scene. J. Broadcast. Electron. Media 33, 397–418.

Wilson, B. J., and Cantor, J. (1987). Reducing fear reactions to mass media: effects of visual exposure and verbal explanation. Ann. Int. Commun. Assoc. 10, 553–573.

Wilson, B. J., Hoffner, C., and Cantor, J. (1987). Children’s perceptions of the effectiveness of techniques to reduce fear from mass media. J. Appl. Dev. Psychol. 8, 39–52. doi: 10.1016/0193-3973(87)90019-0

Worth, K. A., Chambers, J. G., Nassau, D. H., Rakhra, B. K., and Sargent, J. D. (2008). Exposure of US adolescents to extremely violent movies. Pediatrics 122, 306–312. doi: 10.1542/peds.2007-1096

Wühr, P., Lange, B. P., and Schwarz, S. (2017). Tears or fears? Comparing gender stereotypes about movie preferences to actual preferences. Front. Psychol. 8:428. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2017.00428

Yartz, A. R., and Hawk, L. W. Jr. (2002). Addressing the specificity of affective startle modulation: fear versus disgust. Biol. Psychol. 59, 55–68. doi: 10.1016/S0301-0511(01)00121-1

Zaslow, M. J., and Hayes, C. D. (1986). Sex differences in children’s response to psychosocial stress: toward a cross-context analysis. Adv. Dev. Psychol. 4, 285–337.

Zhang, Y., Chen, Q., Du, F., Hu, Y., Chao, F., Tian, M., et al. (2012). Frightening music triggers rapid changes in brain monoamine receptors: a pilot PET study. J. Nucl. Med. 53, 1573–1578. doi: 10.2967/jnumed.112.106690

Zillmann, D., and Cantor, J. R. (1977). Affective responses to the emotions of a protagonist. J. Exp. Soc. Psychol. 13, 155–165. doi: 10.1016/S0022-1031(77)80008-5

Zillmann, D. (1980). “Anatomy of suspense” in The entertainment functions of television . ed. P. H. Tannenbaum (London: Psychology Press), 133–163.

Zillmann, D. (1996). “The psychology of suspense in dramatic exposition” in Suspense: Conceptualizations, theoretical analyses, and empirical explorations . eds. P. Vorderer, H. J. Wulff, and M. Friedrichsen (New York: Routledge).

Zillmann, D., Hay, T. A., and Bryant, J. (1975). The effect of suspense and its resolution on the appreciation of dramatic presentations. J. Res. Pers. 9, 307–323. doi: 10.1016/0092-6566(75)90005-7

Zillmann, D., Weaver, J. B., Mundorf, N., and Aust, C. F. (1986). Effects of an opposite-gender companion’s affect to horror on distress, delight, and attraction. J. Pers. Soc. Psychol. 51, 586–594. doi: 10.1037/0022-3514.51.3.586

Zuckerman, M. (1979). Attribution of success and failure revisited, or: the motivational bias is alive and well in attribution theory. J. Pers. 47, 245–287. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-6494.1979.tb00202.x

Zuckerman, M. (1988). Sensation seeking and behavior disorders. Arch. Gen. Psychiatry 45, 502–503. doi: 10.1001/archpsyc.1988.01800290124017

Zuckerman, M. (1994). Behavioral expressions and biosocial bases of sensation seeking . Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Zuckerman, M., and Litle, P. (1986). Personality and curiosity about morbid and sexual events. Personal. Individ. Differ. 7, 49–56. doi: 10.1016/0191-8869(86)90107-8

Keywords: horror, terror, fear, film, cinema

Citation: Martin GN (2019) (Why) Do You Like Scary Movies? A Review of the Empirical Research on Psychological Responses to Horror Films. Front. Psychol . 10:2298. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2019.02298

Received: 07 February 2019; Accepted: 25 September 2019; Published: 18 October 2019.

Reviewed by:

Copyright © 2019 Martin. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY) . The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

*Correspondence: G. Neil Martin, [email protected]

Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

The Exorcist (1973) directed by William Friedkin. Photo by Warner Bros. Pictures/Getty Images

You might think that horror movies are a delicious, trashy pleasure. But watching them has surprisingly wholesome effects

by Mathias Clasen   + BIO

I’m a full-time horror researcher with my own lab. I read Stephen King novels at bedtime, watch slasher movies on the weekends, and play survival horror video games whenever I have a spare moment.

But it wasn’t always like that. The first time I saw a horror film at the movie theatre, I left halfway through. It was too much for 14-year-old me. There I was, in the darkness of the cinema, staring at monsters cavorting on the screen and listening to the other teenagers screaming in delight around me. Anxious excitement had turned to heart-stopping horror as those on-screen monsters unfolded their full potential for death and grisly dismemberment.

It was a loss of face from which I have never fully recovered. The burning shame of leaving early is about as vivid in my memory as the metallic terror of witnessing the gory acts of those homicidal monsters.

One particular scene is etched in my mind. Just as the main character – a sympathetic and attractive young woman – is about to kiss her charming date, his handsome face contorts and transforms into the visage of a cat-like monstrosity, with a mouth full of sharp fangs. She manages to fight him off and runs into the arms of a policeman, who helps the sobbing woman into his patrol car. Phew! But then, the cat-man-monster shows up behind the cop with a pencil in his hand. He slams it, pointy end first, into the unfortunate lawman’s ear with a squishy-crunchy sound. The cop then falls over, landing on the side of his head from which the pencil protrudes… with another squishy-crunchy sound to follow.

For all its visceral and violent unpleasantness, the experience of watching this movie – some of it, anyway – ignited a curiosity in me. Why did all the other teenagers around me seem to enjoy this grotesque flick – Sleepwalkers (1992), if you’d been wondering. Indeed, why do so many people voluntarily seek out entertainment that is designed to shock and scare them? What do they get out of it? A thrill, a jolt to the nervous system – or is there something deeper going on?

Horror movies come in various forms, which can be divided into two main subgenres: supernatural ones (think of wailing ghosts, rotting zombies or mind-shattering abominations from forbidden dimensions), and the more psychological (your masked-serial-killers and giant-reptiles varieties). Common to them all is that they aim to evoke negative emotions, such as fear, anxiety, disgust and dread. They also tend to be enormously popular. According to a survey my colleagues and I conducted a few years ago, more than half of US respondents – about 55 per cent – say they enjoy ‘scary media’, including movies such as The Exorcist (1973), books such as King’s Salem’s Lot (1975) and video games such as Amnesia: The Dark Descent (2010) .

What’s more, people who say they enjoy scary media really mean it. We also asked our respondents how frightening they wanted their horror to be. It might sound like a weird thing to ask – like asking how funny they want their comedies to be – but we wanted to test an old Freudian idea that the negative emotions elicited by the genre are unfortunate byproducts; a price that audiences are willing to pay in order to watch movies that allow them to confront their own repressed desires in monstrous disguise. But that’s not what we found. About 80 per cent of our respondents said they wanted their horror entertainment to be in the moderate-to-highly frightening range. By contrast, a measly 3.9 per cent said that they prefer horror that’s not scary at all.

So, fear and the other negative emotions are central to the appeal of horror, a fact not lost on the creators of horror entertainment. Surely you’ve seen movie trailers claiming to be ‘The scariest movie of all time!’ or promising to make you sleep with the lights on for weeks afterwards. More inventively, the US filmmaker William Castle once took out life insurance on his audience. If any audience member died from fear as they watched his movie Macabre (1958), their bereaved ones would receive $1,000 from Lloyd’s of London. (Nobody did die. But the gimmick surely drew more horror hounds to the picture.)

Unsurprisingly, given their appeal, horror movies are big business. In 2019, 40 new horror movies were released in North America, grossing more than $800 million in the domestic theatrical market alone. Likewise, the US haunted attractions industry is growing steadily, in 2019 generating up to $500 million in ticket sales. The following year, 2020, naturally saw lower numbers, but even in that year of COVID-19 lockdowns and empty movie theatres, horror movies broke all previous records in terms of market share. That development continued into 2021, with the horror genre now accounting for almost 20 per cent of the market share at the US box office. Evidently, people want scary entertainment, even when you’d think the real world was scary enough.

D espite the broad appeal of the horror genre, it is haunted by bias and prejudice. Many people, apparently, think that horror movies are dumb, dangerous or both – artistically unsophisticated, morally corrosive, and psychologically harmful, with a dubious appeal primarily for maladjusted teenage boys. But what does the science say?

Firstly, horror is not a particularly male genre. While boys and men are slightly more likely than girls and women to say that they enjoy horror, the difference is much smaller than many people seem to think. In our aforementioned survey, when we asked to what extent respondents agree with the statement ‘I tend to enjoy horror media’, on a scale from 1 to 5, men averaged at 3.50, whereas women averaged at 3.29.

Secondly, horror movies are not only watched by teenagers. Yes, the movies are often marketed to that audience, and the appetite for horror does seem to peak in late adolescence, but it doesn’t emerge out of the blue the day that kids turn 13, and it doesn’t disappear in older people either. An ongoing research project of ours is finding that the desire to derive pleasure from fear is evident even in toddlers, who universally enjoy mildly scary activities, such as chase play and hide-and-seek. Even old folks seem to enjoy the occasional thrill provided by mildly frightening media such as crime shows. The British crime drama Midsomer Murders (1997-) always seemed to me like light horror for seniors, with its eerie theremin theme tune and the inexplicably abundant, often startlingly grisly murders in the otherwise peaceful fictional Midsomer County.

The ‘monkey see, monkey do’ model of media psychology now seems to have been abandoned by most experts

Thirdly, there is no evidence that horror fans are particularly maladjusted, depraved or unempathetic. When my colleagues and I looked into the personality profile of horror fans, we found that they are about as conscientious, agreeable and emotionally stable as the average person, while also scoring higher than average on openness to experience (meaning that they enjoy intellectual stimulation and adventure). It’s true they do tend to score fairly highly on sensation seeking , which suggests that they tend to be easily bored and on the lookout for excitement. Maladjusted or depraved, though? Nope, no evidence.

If horror movies do not attract the maladjusted and the depraved, do they then create psychotic monsters? One might think so, judging from the moral panics that have surrounded the horror genre throughout its recent history, from Victorian-era concern over ‘penny dreadfuls’ – sensationalist, often spooky or grisly stories sold in cheap (one-penny) instalments – to modern-day media meltdowns over slasher movies.

Most recently, pundits have worried about the effects of so-called ‘torture porn’ movies; films such as Eli Roth’s Hostel franchise (2005-11), about a shadowy organisation that charges people for the opportunity to torture and murder innocents. In the first Hostel movie, we follow a trio of backpackers who are captured by the organisation and sold for torture. The limbs of one backpacker are subjected to a chainsaw; the torso of another to a power drill. Only one of the backpackers makes it out alive (if not completely whole). The film depicts these insidious assaults in all their bloody nastiness, prompting media commentators to rally against the film and its ilk, arguing that their focus on torture and gore stoke unhealthy, sadistic drives in the audience.

There is no substantial evidence to support that concern – audiences know that what they are watching is fiction. The psychological effects of violent media are still discussed by scholars and scientists, but the ‘monkey see, monkey do’ model of media psychology has been severely criticised on methodological and empirical grounds, and now seems to have been abandoned by most experts. In fact, one recent study covering the period 1960-2012 in the US found that, as movie violence went up, real-world violence actually went down.

T his is not to say that horror movies cannot have negative effects. Indeed, media psychologists have documented that most people have some kind of ‘traumatic’ experience with horror movies. I use the quotation marks because we are not really talking about clinical trauma here. For the vast majority of people, such experiences consist of mild behavioural disturbances – nightmares, or sleeping with the lights on, or increased vigilance for a few days. For instance, one study found that around 90 per cent of US college students had had such experiences, including some who had refused to go camping after watching The Blair Witch Project (1999), a movie about three young people getting lost and dying horribly in the woods.

These mild and temporary hangover effects are just one side of the coin. Long ignored by the scientific world, it’s now clear that horror consumption has many positive effects. Moreover, a taste for horror is natural and should not be seen as pathological. Kids who are attracted to monster comics such as Tales from the Crypt (1950-55) and The Walking Dead (2003-19) are perfectly normal, as are teenagers who love slasher movies or adults who enjoy haunted attractions. That taste makes good sense from an evolutionary perspective. People evolved to be curious about danger, and they use stories to learn about the world and themselves. Horror stories specifically allow them to imaginatively simulate worst-case scenarios and teach them about the dark sides of the world, and about the dark spectrum of their own emotional lives.

This morbid curiosity has helped our ancestors stay alive in a dangerous world by learning about it

The behavioural scientist Coltan Scrivner at the University of Chicago calls this appetite ‘morbid curiosity’. Some people have lots of it, and some very little, but most of us are fairly morbidly curious – we have a hard time looking away from an accident, and we occasionally feel the pull of a true crime show, a horror movie or a documentary about the paranormal.

This fascination with the gruesome is adaptive, says Scrivner; it is a learning mechanism that allows us to collect information about the Grim Reaper and his modes of operation, and it underpins the widespread interest in horror. Stephen King tells the story of how, when he was 10 years old, his mother discovered a scrapbook he had been keeping on the spree killer Charles Starkweather, who was at that time at large. ‘Why?’ asked his mother, concerned. King’s answer: ‘I need to look out for this guy. I need to know everything about him, so that if I ever meet him or anybody like him, I can go around.’

So, when we are drawn to horror movies, we are basically giving in to a deep-seated instinct, a morbid curiosity that has helped our ancestors stay alive in a dangerous world by learning about it at a distance, or even vicariously. Horror satisfies this instinct and allows us to engage playfully with made-up worlds that brim with danger, but at no real risk.

T o test this hypothesis, my lab conducted an empirical study , led by my colleague Marc Malmdorf Andersen, at a Danish commercial visitor attraction, Dystopia Haunted House, that’s located in an abandoned factory out in the woods. Every October, the factory comes alive with the groans of zombies and the roar of chainsaws, punctuated every few minutes by screams of joyful terror. We recruited more than 100 paying guests, fitted them with lightweight heartrate monitors and asked them to fill out several questionnaires. We also recorded their behaviour with surveillance cameras at key points inside the haunt, such as the moment when an actor in a lab coat distracted the guests with a crazy-scientist rant, setting up another actor in zombie make-up to jump out from under a table, scaring the guests witless and providing us with wonderful data on behavioural and physiological responses to acute threat events.

Supporting the evolutionary function of horror, we found that there is a sweet spot between fear and enjoyment. People who seek out horror want just the right amount of it. Too scary, and it is unpleasantly overwhelming; not scary enough, and it is boring. But just the right amount of fear, and you are in the zone of recreational horror – a zone in which you are enjoying yourself and might just be learning important things in the process, such as how to regulate your negative emotions.

Emotional regulation is key to recreational horror because we all differ in the intensity of fear that we find tolerable or even pleasurable. As horror researchers have known for a while, not every horror fan is an adrenaline junkie. We explored these emotional dynamics in another study we conducted at Dystopia Haunted House. This time, we recruited several hundred guests and gave them a choice of challenges: either try to become as scared as possible, or try to keep your fear at an absolute minimum as you go through the haunted attraction. As it happened, half the guests chose the maximum-fear challenge and the other half chose the minimum-fear challenge.

People actively use a range of psychological, behavioural and social strategies to achieve their optimum fear level

Our participants reported remarkably different fear levels. Those guests who had chosen to minimise their fear reported, on average, a fear level of 4.3 on a scale from 0 to 9. Those who chose to maximise their fear, on the other hand, reported an average fear level of 7.6. Strikingly, though, both groups reported similar (and very high) levels of satisfaction.

In other words: there are several ways in which people can derive pleasure from recreational horror, whether in a haunted attraction or in front of the screen. For some, it is about maximum stimulation; those people are the adrenaline junkies. But for others, it is about keeping fear at a tolerable level – a challenge in self-control; they have been called ‘white-knucklers’. Common to both groups is that they actively use a range of psychological, behavioural and social strategies to achieve the optimum fear level.

In another recent study , we shed more light on the possible benefits and appeal of horror entertainment and made a surprising discovery in the process: there are three categories of horror fan. Alongside the adrenaline junkies and white-knucklers are what we called the ‘dark copers’. We discovered that the adrenaline junkies experience a mood boost when they seek out horror; the intense stimulation puts them in a better mood. The white-knucklers do not experience that mood boost in response to horror, but they do feel that they learn something about themselves and that they develop as a person. They might discover how much fear they can take, what dread feels like, how they respond to intense stress, and how to regulate their own anxiety – all vital survival skills.

The third kind, the dark copers, had not been previously identified in the scientific literature, and they are intriguing. They reap all the benefits: a mood boost, as well as feeling that they learn something about themselves and how to confront the real scary world, perhaps by simulating frightening encounters – for them, it’s a kind of practice. Maybe the dark copers are the ones that the horror movie industry should be targeting, and not just the adrenaline junkies, who seem to be the intended audience of those ‘Scariest movie ever!’ taglines.

S ceptics might remain unconvinced by the idea that people could learn anything of value from movies about demonic possession, deranged chainsaw killers and homicidal puppets. It might seem outrageous. Well, in the early months of the pandemic, we decided to investigate whether horror fans had any edge over non-fans in terms of psychological resilience. Our thinking was that, if people do indeed practise emotional regulation skills when they watch horror movies, they might be able to use those skills in real-world situations.

That is indeed what we found. People who watched many horror movies reported less psychological distress in response to COVID-19 lockdowns than those who avoid horror movies. Moreover, fans of ‘prepper movies’ – zombie-apocalypse movies, alien-invasion movies, that sort of thing – felt more prepared for the consequences of the pandemic. They had seen similar things in the movies. They had imaginatively rehearsed for such scenarios, and were less overwhelmed by the repercussions of the crisis. A fictional scenario about the undead overturning the social order – with healthcare systems collapsing, law and order deteriorating, and infrastructure toppling – might not be that different from a real-world situation of great social and institutional turmoil.

Horror movies, then, can function as inoculation against the stresses and terrors of the world. They help us improve our coping skills, and they might function as a kind of enjoyable exposure therapy. There is also some preliminary evidence to suggest that people who suffer from anxiety disorders can find comfort in horror movies, presumably because these movies allow them to experience negative emotions in controlled and controllable doses, practise regulation strategies, and ultimately build resilience.

People go in with strangers; 50 minutes later, they stumble out, chatting and laughing like old friends

In addition to those psychological benefits, there might be social benefits of watching horror movies. Consider how scientists of religion have puzzled over the prevalence of painful religious rituals. Why do people fire-walk and pierce themselves with sharp objects in religious contexts? Apparently, one major function is that such psychologically and/or physically painful behaviours strengthen group identity and make group members more altruistic toward each other. You go through a painful experience together , which reinforces group bonds. It’s a similar story for horror entertainment.

Even some non-fans let themselves be talked into watching a horror movie with friends, presumably because watching horror films together can be a lot of fun, whether you enjoy the movies themselves or not. Recall that about 55 per cent of Americans in our survey said that they enjoy horror. Well, almost 90 per cent of the individuals sampled in our more recent study had sought out horror at least once in the prior year. Evidently, it is not just horror fans who watch horror movies.

When you face a frightening situation together, and make it through that situation together, you feel that you have mastered it, not unlike the dysphoric religious rituals observed around the world. My colleagues and I see this all the time in our haunted house research. People go through the attraction with strangers. They seem nervous and fidgety before they enter; 50 minutes later, they come stumbling out of the haunted house, sweating, chatting and laughing like old friends.

For many viewers, perhaps most, horror movies provide meaningful entertainment that can have positive psychological and social effects. The genre is still steeped in stigma, maybe because it seems to appeal to ‘primitive’ emotions such as fear, anxiety and disgust. Horror movies rarely receive prestigious accolades, such as Academy Awards, and horror writers, such as Stephen King, have struggled to gain critical recognition. This prejudice is silly. The literary canon brims with frightening material – check your Shakespeare, or your Melville – and besides, horror movies do not appeal just to emotions. Many of them also appeal to the intellect, and prompt reflection and maybe even introspection.

If you don’t believe me, find a horror movie to watch tonight, and see for yourself. The trick will be to chose a movie that hits your sweet spot. You don’t want something that overwhelms you with horror, as happened to me in 1992, but you also don’t want something too tame. Once you have found something that seems to fit the bill, invite a couple of friends over so you also reap the social benefits of collective horror-movie watching. And rest assured that, while you might suffer a few mild side-effects, such as a nightmare or a compulsion to sweep the bedroom for monsters before bedtime, there is a real chance that you will feel closer to your friends, learn something about yourself, and perhaps even emerge more resilient than before.

To read more about emotional regulation, visit Psyche , a digital magazine from Aeon that illuminates the human condition through psychology, philosophy and the arts.

Psychiatry and psychotherapy

For those who hear voices, the ‘broken brain’ explanation is harmful. Psychiatry must embrace new meaning-making frameworks

Justin Garson

Neuroscience

The melting brain

It’s not just the planet and not just our health – the impact of a warming climate extends deep into our cortical fissures

Clayton Page Aldern

Falling for suburbia

Modernists and historians alike loathed the millions of new houses built in interwar Britain. But their owners loved them

Michael Gilson

Sex and sexuality

Sexual sensation

What makes touch on some parts of the body erotic but not others? Cutting-edge biologists are arriving at new answers

David J Linden

Nature and landscape

Land loneliness

To survive, we are asked to forget that our lands and bodies are being violated, policed, ripped up, silenced, sacrificed

Human reproduction

When babies are born, they cry in the accent of their mother tongue: how does language begin in the womb?

Darshana Narayanan

Best Essays and Books About Horror Movies

Your changes have been saved

Email is sent

Email has already been sent

Please verify your email address.

You’ve reached your account maximum for followed topics.

Disney Channel's Spine-Tingling Last Original Horror Movie Is Scarier Than You Think

The forgotten dune miniseries adapted something denis villeneuve would like to avoid, rip, redbox: from industry disruptor to 'a train wreck like nothing i’ve ever seen'.

You’ve probably wondered about the inspiration behind your favorite scary movies and the background of some of those horrifying stories. Sometimes the origins of a horror movie are as simple as an author telling a scary story, and at other times films are based on more sinister, true events . You might also be interested in the making of certain horror movies or the impact they have on the audience or the cast. Maybe you're into film theory and want to study the gender dynamics, cultural and political significance, and philosophy of horror, like in Carol Clover's seminal book Men, Women, and Chainsaws . Luckily, there are plenty of resources that explore these exact topics and the development of horror movies in general.

You might be interested in why people are attracted to horror movies and the act of feeling fear. In which case, you might want to read Stephen King’s essay Why We Crave Horror Movies . Digging even deeper, you might notice horror films can help us examine fears around eating, sexuality, religion, and more. You might even wonder about the characters that often die first and why, which is explained by Lindsay King-Miller in her essay A Love Letter to the Girls Who Die First in Horror Movies . Whatever it may be, in addition to the aforementioned texts, here are the best essays and books about horror movies.

Monsters in the Movies: 100 Years of Cinematic Nightmares

Director John Landis ( American Werewolf in London, Twilight Zone: The Movie ) wrote a book on movie monsters covers some of cinema’s most terrifying creatures and their development. Landis explores the design of movie monsters and special effects, both in high and low-budget films. Monsters in the Movies includes interviews with the minds behind the monsters, their historical origins, and tricks behind bringing these ghouls to life.

Nothing Has Prepared Me for Womanhood Better than Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2

Sarah Kurchak’s essay examines a subject people might not consider in horror movies. The truth is that many scary films express beliefs about women and their experiences via horror and gore. Kurchak dissects how Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 features female stereotypes in hot pants but also explores women facing the threats of men and emerging from adolescence completely altered. Kurchak argues that this horror comedy can teach female viewers about what to expect from the world and adolescence.

Stephen King At the Movies: A Complete History of Film and Television Adaptations from the Master of Horror

The chilling stories of author Stephen King have made both startling reads and frightening films. King’s works have established more than 60 horror movies and 30 television series. This book covers the making of all of them, including behind-the-scenes material and King’s opinion on some adaptations. If you’re looking to dive deeper into some iconic films based on King’s stories , consider picking up Stephen King at the Movies .

There’s Nothing Scarier than a Hungry Woman

Remember how we said that horror movies can contain messages that don’t appear obvious on the surface? Laura Maw notices how in many horror movies there is always a scene of a ravenous woman eating, and her fascinating essay considers the meaning behind that.

Related: Best Performances in Horror Films of All Time, Ranked

Maw writes that “horror invites us to sit with this disgust, this anxiety, and to acknowledge our appetite and refuse to suppress it.” Maw presents a feminist analysis of hungry women in well-known horror movies in a way which both explores and challenges preconceptions about women.

Behind the Horror: True Stories that Inspired Horror Movies

Dr. Lee Miller’s research into the origin stories of movies like The Exorcist and A Nightmare on Elm Street are compiled in this handy book. Miller details the true accounts of disappearances, murders, and hauntings that inspired these hit movies.

Behind the Horror explains the history of the serial killers featured in Silence of the Lambs and takes a good look at the possessions that motivated the making of The Exorcist and The Conjuring 2 .

My Favorite Horror Movie: 48 Essays by Horror Creators on the Film that Shaped Them

Arguably one of the best books to read if you are curious about the makers behind famous horror movies. My Favorite Horror Movie features over 20 essays from filmmakers, actors, set designers, musicians, and more about the dark works that solidified their careers.

The films discussed include It , Halloween , The Shining , and others. It’s a good book for looking at horror movies from different angles and recognizing the many minds that contributed to these iconic works.

The Art of Horror: An Illustrated History

Yet another great book for establishing a rounded perspective of horror movies, this time in a much more visual way. The Art of Horror sorts through famous illustrations, movie posters, cover art, comics, paintings, photos, and filmmakers since the beginning of horror with Bram Stoker’s Dracula and Mary Shelley’s infamous Frankenstein . Learn about these talented artists, their chilling work, and their impact on the direction of horror.

Wes Craven: Interviews

If you’re trying to hear from the best horror directors themselves, the Wes Craven interviews are a great place to start. Craven is responsible for films like Scream , The Hills Have Eyes , A Nightmare on Elm Street , and The Last House on the Left , and is often considered one of the greatest horror filmmakers of all time.

Related: The Best Scream Queens of All Time, Ranked

Craven established a particular style in his films that changed the way horror movies are made, and this book pulls information from the master himself. Wes Craven: Interviews includes almost 30 interviews with the director ranging from the 1980s until Craven passed away in 2015.

101 Horror Movies You Should See Before You Die

Ever wonder if you’re missing a great horror film from your spooky collection? This is the book for you. 101 Horror Movies You Should See Before You Die covers the absolute essentials of every kind of horror film, from gothic to slasher and international horror classics as well. Horror can take on so many different forms and this book is one of the best for finding horror films you might have missed.

The Science of Women in Horror: The Special Effects Stunts, and Stories Behind Your Every Fright

Authors Meg Hafdahl and Kelly Florence examine women in horror movies in this book that explores feminist horror films , and more misogynistic ones from the standpoint of feminist film theory. The Science of Women in Horror recalls the history of women in horror movies and goes on to analyze more recent, women-centered horror flicks and series such as The Haunting of Hill House and Buffy the Vampire Slayer . If you want to know more about the women on and off-screen in horror movies, check out this book!

Purdue Online Writing Lab Purdue OWL® College of Liberal Arts

Film Writing: Sample Analysis

Welcome to the Purdue OWL

This page is brought to you by the OWL at Purdue University. When printing this page, you must include the entire legal notice.

Copyright ©1995-2018 by The Writing Lab & The OWL at Purdue and Purdue University. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, reproduced, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed without permission. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our terms and conditions of fair use.

Introductory Note

The analysis below discusses the opening moments of the science fiction movie  Ex Machina  in order to make an argument about the film's underlying purpose. The text of the analysis is formatted normally. Editor's commentary, which will occasionally interrupt the piece to discuss the author's rhetorical strategies, is written in brackets in an italic font with a bold "Ed.:" identifier. See the examples below:

The text of the analysis looks like this.

[ Ed.:  The editor's commentary looks like this. ]

Frustrated Communication in Ex Machina ’s Opening Sequence

Alex Garland’s 2015 science fiction film Ex Machina follows a young programmer’s attempts to determine whether or not an android possesses a consciousness complicated enough to pass as human. The film is celebrated for its thought-provoking depiction of the anxiety over whether a nonhuman entity could mimic or exceed human abilities, but analyzing the early sections of the film, before artificial intelligence is even introduced, reveals a compelling examination of humans’ inability to articulate their thoughts and feelings. In its opening sequence, Ex Machina establishes that it’s not only about the difficulty of creating a machine that can effectively talk to humans, but about human beings who struggle to find ways to communicate with each other in an increasingly digital world.

[ Ed.:  The piece's opening introduces the film with a plot summary that doesn't give away too much and a brief summary of the critical conversation that has centered around the film. Then, however, it deviates from this conversation by suggesting that Ex Machina has things to say about humanity before non-human characters even appear. Off to a great start. ]

The film’s first establishing shots set the action in a busy modern office. A woman sits at a computer, absorbed in her screen. The camera looks at her through a glass wall, one of many in the shot. The reflections of passersby reflected in the glass and the workspace’s dim blue light make it difficult to determine how many rooms are depicted. The camera cuts to a few different young men typing on their phones, their bodies partially concealed both by people walking between them and the camera and by the stylized modern furniture that surrounds them. The fourth shot peeks over a computer monitor at a blonde man working with headphones in. A slight zoom toward his face suggests that this is an important character, and the cut to a point-of-view shot looking at his computer screen confirms this. We later learn that this is Caleb Smith (Domhnall Gleeson), a young programmer whose perspective the film follows.

The rest of the sequence cuts between shots from Caleb’s P.O.V. and reaction shots of his face, as he receives and processes the news that he has won first prize in a staff competition. Shocked, Caleb dives for his cellphone and texts several people the news. Several people immediately respond with congratulatory messages, and after a moment the woman from the opening shot runs in to give him a hug. At this point, the other people in the room look up, smile, and start clapping, while Caleb smiles disbelievingly—perhaps even anxiously—and the camera subtly zooms in a bit closer. Throughout the entire sequence, there is no sound other than ambient electronic music that gets slightly louder and more textured as the sequence progresses. A jump cut to an aerial view of a glacial landscape ends the sequence and indicates that Caleb is very quickly transported into a very unfamiliar setting, implying that he will have difficulty adjusting to this sudden change in circumstances.

[ Ed.:  These paragraphs are mostly descriptive. They give readers the information they will need to understand the argument the piece is about to offer. While passages like this can risk becoming boring if they dwell on unimportant details, the author wisely limits herself to two paragraphs and maintains a driving pace through her prose style choices (like an almost exclusive reliance on active verbs). ]

Without any audible dialogue or traditional expository setup of the main characters, this opening sequence sets viewers up to make sense of Ex Machina ’s visual style and its exploration of the ways that technology can both enhance and limit human communication. The choice to make the dialogue inaudible suggests that in-person conversations have no significance. Human-to-human conversations are most productive in this sequence when they are mediated by technology. Caleb’s first response when he hears his good news is to text his friends rather than tell the people sitting around him, and he makes no move to take his headphones out when the in-person celebration finally breaks out. Everyone in the building is on their phones, looking at screens, or has headphones in, and the camera is looking at screens through Caleb’s viewpoint for at least half of the sequence.  

Rather than simply muting the specific conversations that Caleb has with his coworkers, the ambient soundtrack replaces all the noise that a crowded building in the middle of a workday would ordinarily have. This silence sets the uneasy tone that characterizes the rest of the film, which is as much a horror-thriller as a piece of science fiction. Viewers get the sense that all the sounds that humans make as they walk around and talk to each other are being intentionally filtered out by some presence, replaced with a quiet electronic beat that marks the pacing of the sequence, slowly building to a faster tempo. Perhaps the sound of people is irrelevant: only the visual data matters here. Silence is frequently used in the rest of the film as a source of tension, with viewers acutely aware that it could be broken at any moment. Part of the horror of the research bunker, which will soon become the film’s primary setting, is its silence, particularly during sequences of Caleb sneaking into restricted areas and being startled by a sudden noise.

The visual style of this opening sequence reinforces the eeriness of the muted humans and electronic soundtrack. Prominent use of shallow focus to depict a workspace that is constructed out of glass doors and walls makes it difficult to discern how large the space really is. The viewer is thus spatially disoriented in each new setting. This layering of glass and mirrors, doubling some images and obscuring others, is used later in the film when Caleb meets the artificial being Ava (Alicia Vikander), who is not allowed to leave her glass-walled living quarters in the research bunker. The similarity of these spaces visually reinforces the film’s late revelation that Caleb has been manipulated by Nathan Bates (Oscar Isaac), the troubled genius who creates Ava.

[ Ed.:  In these paragraphs, the author cites the information about the scene she's provided to make her argument. Because she's already teased the argument in the introduction and provided an account of her evidence, it doesn't strike us as unreasonable or far-fetched here. Instead, it appears that we've naturally arrived at the same incisive, fascinating points that she has. ]

A few other shots in the opening sequence more explicitly hint that Caleb is already under Nathan’s control before he ever arrives at the bunker. Shortly after the P.O.V shot of Caleb reading the email notification that he won the prize, we cut to a few other P.O.V. shots, this time from the perspective of cameras in Caleb’s phone and desktop computer. These cameras are not just looking at Caleb, but appear to be scanning him, as the screen flashes in different color lenses and small points appear around Caleb’s mouth, eyes, and nostrils, tracking the smallest expressions that cross his face. These small details indicate that Caleb is more a part of this digital space than he realizes, and also foreshadow the later revelation that Nathan is actively using data collected by computers and webcams to manipulate Caleb and others. The shots from the cameras’ perspectives also make use of a subtle fisheye lens, suggesting both the wide scope of Nathan’s surveillance capacities and the slightly distorted worldview that motivates this unethical activity.

[ Ed.: This paragraph uses additional details to reinforce the piece's main argument. While this move may not be as essential as the one in the preceding paragraphs, it does help create the impression that the author is noticing deliberate patterns in the film's cinematography, rather than picking out isolated coincidences to make her points. ]

Taken together, the details of Ex Machina ’s stylized opening sequence lay the groundwork for the film’s long exploration of the relationship between human communication and technology. The sequence, and the film, ultimately suggests that we need to develop and use new technologies thoughtfully, or else the thing that makes us most human—our ability to connect through language—might be destroyed by our innovations. All of the aural and visual cues in the opening sequence establish a world in which humans are utterly reliant on technology and yet totally unaware of the nefarious uses to which a brilliant but unethical person could put it.

Author's Note:  Thanks to my literature students whose in-class contributions sharpened my thinking on this scene .

[ Ed.: The piece concludes by tying the main themes of the opening sequence to those of the entire film. In doing this, the conclusion makes an argument for the essay's own relevance: we need to pay attention to the essay's points so that we can achieve a rich understanding of the movie. The piece's final sentence makes a chilling final impression by alluding to the danger that might loom if we do not understand the movie. This is the only the place in the piece where the author explicitly references how badly we might be hurt by ignorance, and it's all the more powerful for this solitary quality. A pithy, charming note follows, acknowledging that the author's work was informed by others' input (as most good writing is). Beautifully done. ]

Home — Essay Samples — Entertainment — Jaws — A Review Of The Horror Movie Jaws

A Review of The Horror Movie Jaws

• Categories: Jaws Movie Review

About this sample

Words: 621 |

Published: Oct 25, 2021

Words: 621 | Page: 1 | 4 min read

Cite this Essay

To export a reference to this article please select a referencing style below:

Let us write you an essay from scratch

• 450+ experts on 30 subjects ready to help
• Custom essay delivered in as few as 3 hours

Get high-quality help

Dr Jacklynne

Verified writer

• Expert in: Entertainment

+ 120 experts online

By clicking “Check Writers’ Offers”, you agree to our terms of service and privacy policy . We’ll occasionally send you promo and account related email

No need to pay just yet!

Related Essays

2.5 pages / 1123 words

3 pages / 1310 words

4.5 pages / 2017 words

2 pages / 925 words

Remember! This is just a sample.

You can get your custom paper by one of our expert writers.

121 writers online

Still can’t find what you need?

Browse our vast selection of original essay samples, each expertly formatted and styled

Related Essays on Jaws

The horror movie Jaws directed by Steven Spielberg is an award-winning film released in 1975. The film revolves around a killer shark that tormented Amity Island beach on summer holiday. This situation causes havoc throughout [...]

Casablanca, directed by Michael Curtiz and released in 1942, exhibits qualities of both the Classical Hollywood Narrative and Art Cinema. These two film structures are the equivalent to formalism in literature, but also point to [...]

Any time a play or a novel is adapted into a film portrayal of the text, critics will evaluate the film either in a positive or a negative manner. It is necessary to understand the freedoms a director has, and understand that an [...]

A little boy went to the corner store to pick up the newest edition of his favorite comic; Batman. The boy entered the store and despite his efforts to withhold his excitement, dashed straight to the massive stack of magazines [...]

Rick, a kindhearted man with a strong moral compass, is far from the most detestable of the characters in Casablanca. While he demonstrates some qualities and actions that could lead to the assumption that he is loathsome, he is [...]

Set in a dystopian Los Angeles of 2019, Blade Runner follows Rick Deckard (Harrison Ford), an ex-policeman brought out of retirement to eliminate a group of renegade replicants who have illegally arrived on Earth. During [...]

Related Topics

By clicking “Send”, you agree to our Terms of service and Privacy statement . We will occasionally send you account related emails.

Where do you want us to send this sample?

By clicking “Continue”, you agree to our terms of service and privacy policy.

Be careful. This essay is not unique

This essay was donated by a student and is likely to have been used and submitted before

Download this Sample

Free samples may contain mistakes and not unique parts

Sorry, we could not paraphrase this essay. Our professional writers can rewrite it and get you a unique paper.

Please check your inbox.

We can write you a custom essay that will follow your exact instructions and meet the deadlines. Let's fix your grades together!

Get Your Personalized Essay in 3 Hours or Less!

We use cookies to personalyze your web-site experience. By continuing we’ll assume you board with our cookie policy .

• Instructions Followed To The Letter
• Deadlines Met At Every Stage
• Unique And Plagiarism Free