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An Annotated Bibliography and Reflection

Kathleen Brady
Charles Douglas
UWRT 1101
21 November 2016

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Barbiero, Elena. "Addiction and Type-T Personality: Addicted to Horror." Web log post.
Health Guidence, n.d. Web. 13 Nov. 2016.
<http://www.healthguidance.org/entry/16460/1/Addiction-and-Type-T-PersonalityAddicted-to-Horror.html>.
This article is based off a recovery addicts view of our mental and emotional response of
watching horror films. Horror as a genre promotes a range of natural fears, so watching horror
films may have an important psychological function of deeply placed subconscious fears, but
stated there may be also an addictive side.
The author describes addiction as more than an innocent habit, its a cycle where the
individual uses the fear, to boost the mood up therefore, consequently falling into an even worse
in the outcome. The author discussions about how the addict needs then to use frequently to
avoid the unpleasant emotions that people are trying to avoid in first place, as they come back
amplified.
Fascinatingly though, the human body enjoys horror when it knows its not real but has
that emotional or psychological trigger from it. When faced with a realistic occurrence that feels
like something out of a horror movie, we withdrawal ourselves from the current situation. That is
the normal human response.
DeGroat, Bernie. "Scary Movies Can Have Lasting Effects on Children and Teens, Study
Says." The University Record, 29 Mar. 1999. Web. 13 Nov. 2016. The
<http://ur.umich.edu/9899/Mar29_99/9.htm>.
This journal opens how the short-term effects of watching horror movies or other films
and television programs with disturbing content are recorded among children and teens. The
author gives clear evidence based of a new study shows that long-term effects can remain even
into adulthood.

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Through research, I found that fifty-two percent of the sample reported disturbances in
normal behavior as day to day activities such as eating or sleeping. These people avoided these
situations in their own lives, and reported obsessive thinking or talking about the frightening
situation.
A survey was taken in the academic study to see how many college students are effected
to a psychological level by watching horror films. In summary, one in four college students in a
recent study said they experience haunting effects of a frightful movie from childhood. These
effects range from inability to sleep to avoidance of situations portrayed in those movies. Being a
college student who loves horror movies myself, I can personally see how this can come into
play.

Feature, Richard. "Why We Love Scary Movies." Mental Health Center. WebMD, n.d.
Web. 13 Nov. 2016. <http://www.webmd.com/mental-health/features/why-we-love-scarymovies>.
This article is broken up into multiple different sections talking about how even the
horror in films may be fictional but the fear is real. Like the fear, you feel when you watch
someone being chased by an axe-wielding murderer any different from the fear you might feel if
an axe-wielding murderer was chasing you. They even give an answer to the own questions they
ask, which can be helpful if it is directly applied to the reader on an emotional and mental level.
As technology continues to grow the brain cannot keep up with all new developed
technology, but it can tell that the images on the movie screen are obviously not real. Even so ,
those images are now in your subconscious and linger there until there is an event that brings up
that event the evokes a natural fear in reality.

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Next is just the fascination that horror movies bring to the idea how it can affect the
human brain. The author of the article explains the appeal of scary movies in this section. For
young to older adults, dark curiosity may be at play, the same kind that causes us to stare at car
crashes on the freeway. We may have an essential need to stay aware of threats around us,
especially the kind that could do us bodily injury.
So, horror movies affecting our mental and emotional health is very present in this
specific article. That even when were watching the brain bring those feelings to a reality
situation and makes you feel that experience that the protagonist is feeling within the movie.

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My Reflection:
As a fanatic to horror movies myself, I always wondered how horror flicks affected my
own health. From the beginning, there was an instant connection I was always drawn to horror,
the feeling of exhilaration and terror that it presented. Prior doing a presentation on the Horror
Genre Film and Literature, there was an immediate reaction over the students I conveyed the
information to. I saw two different reactions, those who feared but were interested and those who
had zero interest into the subject. Looking through these articles, I saw exactly that. I wanted
three articles/journals so one of them is against horror, another that is agreeable and finally one
that is indifferent so that it gives valid information that it is against and for horror films for the
human health.
Finding these articles were incredibly simple, there is just so much research from so
many credible sources. Rather coming from doctors or even a recovering addict, I can get a clear
picture of what to expect from the given information.
The first article I wanted to find someone who has gone through a horror film
(psychologically) situation so I found someone who is a recovering addict from horror films and
their opinion what horror movies does to the human brain and body. How watching horror
movies promote the subconscious fears that induce paranoia to a whole new psychological level,
that the brain cant handle and then makes you go crazy.
Next, the second article I wanted it to be based on the lasting effects that scary movies
have on teens and children. So this one would be the one against watching horror films. One of
the examples the author could provide was that more than a third avoided or dreaded the depicted
situation in their own lives, and nearly a fourth reported obsessive thinking or talking about the
frightening stimulus.

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Finally, the article from WebMD put the most emphasis on how people react to horror
movies. I wanted to put the one that was agreeable last, so readers could see the difference
between the article that was so indifferent to the one that was against the idea of watching horror
films. It was intended for those towards those who are intrigued by such intense fright.
These articles werent full intended on the whole text analysis but more of an informative
brochure that is directive towards the reader. The modification may throw off the reader due
what they are used to, but I feel that it gives a new perspective to the reader entirely.
Between all three articles the two that were the most contradicting were from WebMD
and The University Record, since one of these articles talk about how horror movies are good for
our health and how it makes us more alert but the other one talks about how having this type of
experience is bad for our brain since it can disturb the brain of a psychological level where it
affects our eating and sleeping patterns.
There were obvious similarities among all three articles/academic journal. All of them
dealt with a body of works, rather than focusing on analyzing a single topic of the article. All
three of the articles/journal, discuss the merit of these facts and opinions based off what research
tells us. Overall whats most important is that they all dealt with how horror movies affect the
mental and psychological states of the brain and how they can have a lasting effect on how we
perform our daily abilities such as eating or sleeping.