Page 304 - Media Effects Advances in Theory and Research

11. FRIGHT REACTIONS TO MASS MEDIA 293

ters. One mechanism underlying such responses is empathy. Although
there is controversy over the origins of empathic processes (see Berger,
1962; Feshbach, 1982; Hoffman, 1978), it is clear that under some circum-
stances, people experience fear as a direct response to the fear expressed
by others. Many frightening films seem to stress characters’ expressions of
fear in response to dangers as much as the perceptual cues associated
with the threat itself (see Wilson & Cantor, 1985).
Another indirect mechanism that may be proposed to account for emo-
tional responses to the experiences of others derives from the fact that
witnessing other people risk danger can produce the “vicarious” experi-
ence of fear, even when the persons at risk do not express fear. Zillmann
and Cantor (1977) showed that people respond with dysphoria to the mis-
fortunes of characters for whom they have affection or for whom they at
least do not feel antipathy. Therefore, fear may be seen as deriving from
the anticipation of empathy with the distress responses of liked charac-
ters. Both survey and experimental findings indicate that the threat of
harm to human or animal protagonists is a common source of media-
induced fear (e.g., Cantor, 1998; Cantor & Omdahl, 1991).

Factors Affecting the Tendency to Respond
Emotionally to Mediated Stimuli

Three factors are proposed to have an impact on viewers’ tendencies to
respond emotionally to mediated fear-evoking stimuli: (a) the similarity
of the depicted stimuli to real-life fear-evokers, (b) viewers’ motivations
for media exposure, and (c) factors affecting emotionality, generally.

Similarity of Depicted Stimuli to Real-Life Fear-Evokers. The notion
of stimulus generalization implies that the greater the similarity between
a conditioned or unconditioned stimulus and the substitute stimulus, the
stronger the generalization response will be. Perceptually speaking, real-
istic depictions of threatening events are more similar to events occurring
in the real world than are animated or stylized depictions of the same
events. Thus, the stimulus generalization notion would predict more
intense responses to live-action violence than to cartoon violence or vio-
lence between puppets, for example. Experimental findings are consistent
with this expectation (e.g., Gunter & Furnham, 1984).
The similarity of depicted stimuli to those stimuli that provoke fear in a
particular individual should also enhance stimulus generalization. Exper-
iments have shown that an individual’s fears (for example, of spiders and
of death) and prior experiences with stressful events (such as childbirth)
intensify the emotional effects of related media presentations (e.g., Sapol-
sky & Zillmann, 1978; Weiss, Katkin, & Rubin, 1968).