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Wicked Nerdery

Where psychology, pop culture, and true crime collide

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horror

4 Key Reasons Why Children in Horror Are Terrifying

From The Exorcist‘s Regan to Orphan‘s Esther and literally all those kids from Children of the Corn and Village of the Damned there’s something downright disturbing about the children in horror movies.  Whether simply victims of circumstance or outright antagonists nothing makes the skin crawl like a dead-eyed child destroying everything in their path or, worse yet, a delighted one giggling as they murder.  The question is, why?  Why is it that, more than freaky monsters and cold-as-ice serial killers, do tiny tots with smiles and eyes all aglow strike us as utterly terrifying?

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How Your Fear Can Actually Be Really Sexy

Certain villainous characters make you love them by connecting on an empathetic level, some train you to enjoy them, and we seek out others for more primal experiences — like our own arousal. More accurately, this arousal is actually the fear we experience while watching slasher-horror films featuring villains like Freddy Krueger, Jason Voorhees, and Michael Myers. Continue reading “How Your Fear Can Actually Be Really Sexy” →

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How We Are Classically Conditioned To Love Monsters

Certain villains are all too human. They are flawed and empathetic. They are beings we can recognize ourselves in and grow from. Other villains are just monsters — vampires, aliens, werewolves and countless strange creatures that spring from the creative mind. There’s little to empathize with; little for the audience to connect to. So why are these monstrous villains still so popular? Perhaps because we’ve been conditioned to enjoy them — not unlike Pavlov’s Dog.

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