Scary-tale Endings: A Sensemaking Model for the Lasting Effect of Psychological Horror Films

August 2019 – December 2019

Abstract

The experience of watching psychological horror movies is one that is well-known and even widely admired by horror fans, but there is little investigation into the process by which these films elicit long-term fear by tapping into an individual’s internal thought and perceptual processes. We investigate this sensemaking process of psycho-horror films instilling fear in one’s psyche through interviews and surveys, as well as computational analysis, to develop a model explaining the psycho-horror experience. In the future, visual analysis and investigation into different mediums like virtual reality could provide greater insight into even more facets of the movie-watching experience in addition to the post-movie effect.