Super-natural fears

Gender-stereotypical attribution of fear and fearlessness in preschool children

Fear and fearlessness are two distinct emotional responses that can occur when a person faces a potentially dangerous situation. These responses seem to be linked to gender stereotypes (fearful female and fearless male). This study examines whether preschool children attribute fear and fearlessness stereotypically in relation to gender and whether their attributions vary as a function of age and gender. One hundred and twenty children (60 boys and 60 girls) aged 3, 4 and 5 years participated in this study. We examined children's gender-stereotypical performance through emotional scenarios and drawing tasks involving fear and fearlessness conditions. The results showed that children's performance was equally stereotypical in the two conditions. An age effect was found: children's gender stereotypical attributions increased with age. The results showed no differences in children's stereotypical performance in regards to their gender and task type (emotional scenarios and drawing tasks). The significance and implications of these findings are discussed in the context of gender-emotion stereotypes.

The role of excitement and enjoyment through subjective evaluation of horror film scenes

The popularity of the horror genre is constantly increasing and still has not reached its peak. As a recreational activity, people watch horror movies in pursuit of excitement and enjoyment. However, we still do not know what traits make people seek out this type of increase in arousal (excitement) and why they find it desirable (enjoyment). Consequently, in this study, we sought to identify observer-related factors that allows consumption of horror content as a recreational activity. Participants (N = 558) answered questions about movie-watching habits, completed measures of cognitive emotion regulation, sensation seeking, paranormal beliefs, morbid curiosity, disgust sensitivity, and rated short scenes from horror movies on dimensions of excitement, enjoyment, disgust, fearfulness, and realness. Our findings suggest that the predictors of excitement and enjoyment are slightly different. Perceived disgust negatively affected enjoyment but did not influence to excitement. Further, both excitement and enjoyment were positively predicted by fearfulness and realness ratings of the scenes, and morbid curiosity. Paranormal beliefs, sensation seeking, disgust sensitivity, anxiety, and emotion regulation strategies were not associated with excitement and enjoyment. Future studies should make a distinction between excitement and enjoyment as they are equally important factors with slightly different backgrounds in recreational fear.

Phobia-specific patterns of cognitive emotion regulation strategies

Although fear plays a vital role in survival, an overly active threat detection system could be maladaptive due to its negative health consequences. Putatively maladaptive emotion regulation (ER) strategies are a core problem in phobias. In contrast, adaptive ER strategies could help downregulate the emotion elicited by a threatening stimulus and decrease anxiety. Yet, the number of studies directly examining the pattern of ER strategies linked to various phobias is still scarce. Thus, this study sought to map the patterns of adaptive and maladaptive ER strategies linked to the three most common phobias (social, animal, and blood-injection-injury [BII]). A total of 856 healthy participants filled out our survey including self-reported measures of social anxiety, snake-, spider-, BII phobia, and cognitive ER strategies. Structural equation modeling was used to test the effects between the variables. The results show that social anxiety and animal phobia were linked to both adaptive and maladaptive ER strategies, while BII was only associated with maladaptive ones. Further analyses showed that the most prominent ER strategies differed by subtype. This is in line with previous neuroimaging studies claiming that the neurocognitive mechanisms underlying phobias are also different. Theoretical as well as practical implications are discussed.

An ethologically based view into human fear

The quality of the defensive response to a threat depends on the elements that trigger the fear response. The current classification system of phobias does not account for this. Here, we analyze the fear-eliciting elements and discern the different types of fears that originate from them. We propose Pain, Disgust, Vasovagal response, Visual-vestibular and postural interactions, Movement and Speed, Distance and Size, Low and mid-level visual features, Smell, and Territory and social status. We subdivide phobias according to the fear-eliciting elements most frequently triggered by them and their impact on behavior. We discuss the implications of a clinical conceptualization of phobias in humans by reconsidering the current nosology. This conceptualization will facilitate finding etiological factors in defensive behavior expression, fine-tuning exposure techniques, and challenging preconceived notions of preparedness. This approach to phobias leads to surprising discoveries and shows how specific responses bear little relation to the interpretation we might later give to them. Dividing fears into their potentially fear-eliciting elements can also help in applying the research principles formulated by the Research Domain Criteria initiative.

Case Study of Recognition Patterns in Haunted People Syndrome

Haunted People Syndrome (HP-S) denotes individuals who recurrently report various “supernatural” encounters in everyday settings ostensibly due to heightened somatic-sensory sensitivities to dis-ease states (e.g., marked but sub-clinical levels of distress), which are contextualized by paranormal beliefs and reinforced by perceptual contagion effects. This view helps to explain why these anomalous experiences often appear to be idioms of stress or trauma. We tested the validity and practical utility of the HP-S concept in an empirical study of an active and reportedly intense ghostly episode that was a clinical referral. The case centered on the life story of the primary percipient, a retired female healthcare worker. Secondary percipients included her husband and adult daughter, all of whom reported an array of benign and threatening anomalies (psychological and physical in nature) across five successive residences. Guided by prior research, we administered the family online measures of transliminality, sensory-processing sensitivity, paranormal belief, locus of control, desirability for control, and a standardized checklist of haunt-type phenomena. The primary percipient also completed a measure of adverse childhood events and supplied an event diary of her anomalous experiences. We found reasonably consistent support for HP-S from a set of quantitative observations that compared five proposed syndrome features against the family members’ psychometric profiles and the structure and contents of their anomalous experiences. Specifically, the reported anomalies both correlated with the family’s scores on transliminality and paranormal belief, as well as elicited attributions and reaction patterns aligned with threat (agency) detection. There was also some evidence of perceptual congruency among the family members’ anomalous experiences. Putative psi cannot be ruled out, but we conclude that the family’s ordeal fundamentally involved the symptoms and manifestations of thin (or “permeable”) mental boundary functioning in the face of unfavorable circumstances or overstimulating environments and subsequently acerbated by poor emotion regulation, histrionic and catastrophizing reactions, and active confirmation biases.