Does being a horror fan make you more resilient?
Studying the impact of horror fandom on resilience during the pandemic.
Before I launch into this week’s article, I just wanted to remind you that my horror collection Kickstarter ends on January 26. It’s a curated collection of short horror and dark fiction tales called “Sweet Delicious Candy,” which is available in an exclusive pocket-sized version for you to read on the go.
I hope you’ll check it out!
I’m a huge horror fan. I always have been.
As a kid, I had a small library of horror books, and loved waking up in the middle of the night to secretly watch horror movies on TV. No matter what complications or challenges that were going on in my life, horror was always there to welcome me into its bloody embrace.
Now, as a creator in my own right, I find myself infusing horror into everything I write - even if it’s not specifically set in the horror genre!
People often ask me: why horror? Why do you like it? Are you obsessed with death?
The answer is that I don’t really know - well except for the last question, which is a definite no!
On one level, I find horror to be an entertaining genre where “shit happens,” in contrast to other genres where story happens at the pace of drying paint. But that’s not really an answer. I think part of me likes the exposure to fear; even though a story may be scary, my rational brain knows it’s on rails and that there will be an ending - but if that’s true, then why don’t I enjoy rollercoasters or BASE jumping the same way? I mean, I get anxiety whenever I have to go on an airplane!
Horror also raises philosophical questions about the nature and finiteness of human existence, which I suppose I also enjoy digging into. Perhaps more than any other genre, horror seems to work at multiple levels and often reveals more as you dig beneath the surface.
But is that the reason I’m drawn to horror?
It’s surprisingly hard for me to articulate why I love horror. There’s just something about the genre that speaks to me like nothing else. In many ways, it’s comforting - and perhaps that’s reason enough.
So I was interested in the findings of a recent paper1 which explored the relationship between horror fans, their psychological resilience, and their preparedness level during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic - which you might recall was a highly traumatic time.
This immediately connected with my own experiences as a horror fan, and before I even finished the abstract, I was analyzing myself through this perspective. I felt I coped relatively well with the pandemic; certainly my depression and anxiety were under control, and I felt more optimistic than many other people I knew. Could horror have helped me - even subconsciously - to prepare and endure the pandemic?
I had to read on to know the answer.
The paper documented a study where 300 Americans were recruited (although there are few details about the cohort) in April 2020 which was relatively early in the pandemic. Participants were asked to rate their level of interest in horror, prepper, and pandemic-focused entertainment alongside standardized tools for measuring psychological resilience: the Pandemic Psychological Resilience Scale (PPRS), the Morbid Curiosity Scale (MCS), the Ten Item Personality Measure (TIPI), and a pandemic preparedness tool.
The MCS is an interesting tool that measures factors that may motivate a person to learn about dangerous or threatening phenomena, which are likely connected to an interest in horror movies/TV shows.
Data analysis began with an Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA). This is a statistical method to identify non-measurable (latent) factors that account for relationships between variables. As there are lots of variables, but typically few factors, this helps to simplify the structure of the entire dataset. The factors and their loadings are shown in several of the tables in the paper.
Analysis of the factor loadings are an interesting discussion in their own right, but let’s not get stuck on that and focus on the next step of their analysis, which was a regression analysis - which also included numerous control variables such as sex, age, income, how much the participant said they enjoyed watching movies and TV shows in general, and each TIPI dimension.
Findings
The paper found that being a horror fan had no impact on psychological resilience or preparedness, but was associated with lower psychological distress (b = -0.1, p<.05). Meanwhile, Prepper movie fans were more prepared for the pandemic (b = 0.11, p<.05), and Morbid curiosity was found to be associated with positive resilience during the pandemic (b = 0.20, p<.01).
Ultimately, the main findings of the study were that horror fans and those who were morbidly curious had more robust psychological resilience during the pandemic. However, these groups were predictors of divergent resilience types. While horror fandom predicted less psychological distress, morbidly curious individuals experienced greater positive resilience - i.e., positive experiences in the face of threats.
This result was also confirmed in a separate paper2 that explored similar questions amongst a group of 224 graduate and undergraduate students at a Christian University in Florida. However, the focus of this paper was more specific to studying potential gender differences rather than overall impact on resilience. A key finding from their regression modelling was that interest in suspense-horror content was associated with increases in psychological resilience and preparation for disruptive events such as those experienced during the pandemic.
What does it mean?
Scary movies are not just entertainment, but they are a useful simulation of fearful, anxiety-inducing scenarios, and can impart skills associated with emotional regulation to viewers.
I think this intuitively makes a lot of sense. As horror fans, we expose ourselves to fearful and traumatic situations, and repeated exposure could be associated with increased resilience.
What I found most interesting is that the findings from the first paper suggest horror fans were not more resilient, but experienced less psychological distress - however, those who were morbidly curious experienced greater positive resilience.
Reflecting back on my own lived experience, I realized I wasn’t just a horror fan, but I was someone who is also morbidly curious (I took a version of the MCS myself which confirmed my hypothesis). Perhaps this explains why I love horror? It not only relieves my psychological distress, but also makes me more resilient in the face of trauma.
Something to ponder, in any event.
Coltan Scrivner, John A. Johnson, Jens Kjeldgaard-Christiansen, Mathias Clasen. Pandemic practice: Horror fans and morbidly curious individuals are more psychologically resilient during the COVID-19 pandemic. Personality and Individual Differences. 168 (2021) 110397. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2020.110397.
Compton, D. M., & Schultz-Hansen, K. (2023). What’s 12 Monkeys Got to Do with It? Resilience during the COVID-19 Pandemic as a Function of Personality and Interest in Suspense-Horror. Psychology, 14, 1217-1249. https://doi.org/10.4236/psych.2023.148067
What did you think? Did the findings surprise you? Had you ever heard of the term “morbid curiosity” before?