Planning a Slasher Movie Date Night for Halloween? This Is How Your Partner May Respond
Study illustrates gender differences in slasher movie perceptions
With Halloween right around the corner, many couples are planning horror movie date nights that will chill them and thrill them. For some people, films on the roster may include slasher movies like The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Friday the 13th, and Halloween. Although these movies are made to elicit some kind of scare response, the way you and your partner experience them may be different, according to research in Sex Roles.
During their study, researchers Justin M. Nolan and Gery W. Ryan had 30 male and 30 female college students describe the plots, as well as their emotional reactions, to what they considered the most memorable slasher films they had ever seen. Their written responses — which mentioned movies including Psycho, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, The Shining, The Omen, and Halloween — revealed that reactions to the films were starkly different based on gender.
“Women…display a greater fear of images connected with family terror and demonic possession….”
Women participants tended to be more responsive to the familial-related danger depicted in…
