How Horror Works (The Mechanics Of Scaring Audiences)

[Mighty_Emperor]

This was just tagged on the end of something else I posted and thought it might be better as its own thread:

The horror formula

Cranking up the fear factor in a horror film requires more than the odd werewolf or demonic possession. British researchers from King's College in London have devised a mathematical formula identifying the most effective way to induce terror in a cinema. Their equation - (es + u + cs + t) squared + s + (tl + f) / 2 + (a + dr + fs) / n + sin x - 1 - shows that suspense and realism are among the key ingredients for a spine-tingling movie.

The research team analysed a range of horror films including The Exorcist, The Blair Witch Project and Psycho.

They found that suspense is primarily generated through escalating music (es) the unknown (u), chase scenes (cs) and the sense of being trapped (t). Because suspense is such a vital quality in a horror movie, the equation is (es + u + cs + t) squared before shock (s) is added.

The Shining, in which the suspense builds gradually through a child's eerie premonitions, was held up as the perfect example of the formula applied.

The experts argue that realism intensifies the mood of anxiety. Therefore the next part of the model adds together true life (tl) and fantasy (f) divided by two (tl+f)/2 to establish the right balance between a plot that is too unrealistic and one that is too mundane.

The smaller the number of characters (a) in the film, the more an audience can identify with them. A darkly lit scene (dr) and an isolated setting (fs) also raise levels of fear. But stereotypical characters (1) diminish the effect and it is actually possible to have too much gore (sin x).

"Steven Spielberg (in Jaws) reached the optimum level," explained mathematician Anna Sigler, who led the research, "perfectly allowing the viewer to see just enough blood to be scared of the great white shark, but not so much that it repulsed us".

Source

 

[Anonymous]

Dont you think these boffins have a bit too much time on their hands? I could tell you if a film was scary in about 90 minutes, and that's without a calculator. :lol:

 

[EnolaGaia]

A new Finnish study has examined the neural and emotional effects of watching horror films.

Horror movies manipulate brain activity expertly to enhance excitement

Finnish research team maps neural activity in response to watching horror movies. A study conducted by the University of Turku shows the top horror movies of the past 100 years, and how they manipulate brain activity.

Humans are fascinated by what scares us, be it sky-diving, roller-coasters, or true-crime documentaries -- provided these threats are kept at a safe distance. Horror movies are no different.

Whilst all movies have our heroes face some kind of threat to their safety or happiness, horror movies up the ante by having some kind of superhuman or supernatural threat that cannot be reasoned with or fought easily.

The research team at the University of Turku, Finland, studied why we are drawn to such things as entertainment? The researchers first established the 100 best and scariest horror movies of the past century (Table 1), and how they made people feel. ...

People found horror that was psychological in nature and based on real events the scariest, and were far more scared by things that were unseen or implied rather than what they could actually see.

- This latter distinction reflects two types of fear that people experience. The creeping foreboding dread that occurs when one feels that something isn't quite right, and the instinctive response we have to the sudden appearance of a monster that make us jump out of our skin, says principal investigator, Professor Lauri Nummenmaa from Turku PET Centre. ...

Researchers wanted to know how the brain copes with fear in response to this complicated and ever changing environment. The group had people watch a horror movie whilst measuring neural activity in a magnetic resonance imaging scanner.

During those times when anxiety is slowly increasing, regions of the brain involved in visual and auditory perception become more active, as the need to attend for cues of threat in the environment become more important. After a sudden shock, brain activity is more evident in regions involved in emotion processing, threat evaluation, and decision making, enabling a rapid response.

However, these regions are in continuous talk-back with sensory regions throughout the movie, as if the sensory regions were preparing response networks as a scary event was becoming increasingly likely.

-Therefore, our brains are continuously anticipating and preparing us for action in response to threat, and horror movies exploit this expertly to enhance our excitement, explains Researcher Matthew Hudson.

FULL STORY: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/01/200124104518.htm

PUBLISHED REPORT:
Matthew Hudson, Kerttu Seppälä, Vesa Putkinen, Lihua Sun, Enrico Glerean, Tomi Karjalainen, Henry K. Karlsson, Jussi Hirvonen, Lauri Nummenmaa. Dissociable neural systems for unconditioned acute and sustained fear. NeuroImage, 2020; 116522
DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2020.116522