Fear Vs Real Fear Essay

Staged vs. real fear: How fear and thrill of haunted house experiences are perceived based on age and gender
Introduction
Fear and thrill are captivating concepts, leading to the question as to how an attraction to situations of staged thrill creates an attraction to real fear. Fear is “a high arousal state” (Kerr, 2015) that is “a reaction to something immediate that threatens your security or safety” (Lamia, 2011); fear often results from real threats rather than staged ones. Thrill is similar to fear but is a result of excitement as opposed to a threating situation; thrill is often paired with staged situations, such as haunted houses and roller coasters. There is emphasis on analyzing adolescents when talking about risks and thrill resulting from a lasting stereotype that adolescents are partaking in more risky behaviors than other age groups.
Many theories have been developed on how and why people are attracted to thrilling stimuli, but there is no conclusive research regarding a single reason for this attraction (Midha, 2014). This leads to the belief that the attraction adolescents feel toward both staged risks and thrill, such as video games, movies, haunted houses, and rollercoasters, and real risks, which include

All of these combine to gross between $400 million and $500 million every year (Haunted House Association, 2012). What makes these attractions so enticing to the public is the fun that accompanies the fear and thrill (Appendix C). According to David Rudd, the dean of the College of Social and Behavioral Science at the University of Utah, “People enjoy feeling scared and seek out the feeling because, deep down, they know they are in no real danger” (Melina, 2010). Instead, “they experience excitement rather than actual fear” (Melina,