Recently in Media, we’ve been looking at audience theory. A theorist we focused on was Paul Wells. With his theory, Wells conducted a small focus group study looking at the relationship between audience and the horror genre. This study involved 12 members of each of the following age groups: 16-25, 26-40, 41-55, and 56-80. He asked them what the earliest horror film they had seen was and what was the most recent.
Conclusions drawn from this study and what I've learned:
- From Wells’ study, we’ve come to conclusion that the relationship to being frightened changes with age and relates to broader factors affecting emotional responses.
- Audiences between 1970s and 1990s are more anaesthetised to explicit special effects, whereas ‘monster’ films of 20s and 30s reported very strong personal response to images and iconography of horror (when cinema was new and unknown).
- Young audiences are aware of artificiality and are becoming harder to shock.
- From Wells’ study, we’ve come to conclusion that the relationship to being frightened changes with age and relates to broader factors affecting emotional responses.
- Audiences between 1970s and 1990s are more anaesthetised to explicit special effects, whereas ‘monster’ films of 20s and 30s reported very strong personal response to images and iconography of horror (when cinema was new and unknown).
- Young audiences are aware of artificiality and are becoming harder to shock.
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