The Impact Of Scary Movies On Children
If you ask three different people about horror movies, you are likely to get three different answers. My own experience as a child was never rewarding, many of the unwanted scenes sticking with me for years. Others tend to insist that a little scare doesn’t bother them, maybe even makes them stronger.
After working with children with trauma anxiety for nearly seven years, the issue for parents also seems more complex than at first glance. We are in a culture that has terrifying scenes and sounds even during prime-time commercials. Do our children need to ‘adjust’ to it eventually?
Age: Things are very different for children under the age of 5 versus those that are older. The younger a child is, the more risk there is for them to take what they are seeing literally or incorporate the scenes into their imaginal and age-typical fears. Ensuring that children are viewing things that are “age-appropriate” in regard to emotional or physical fears is important. Some children can become incredibly distressed over the death of a major character or mirror sadness from the character’s experience; graphic or physical violence can be assumed outside their ability to process alone.
Personality: Some children will seek the risk and thrill of watching terrifying movies outside your supervision. There are many reasons that children and teens choose to watch things that bring intense fear, not all of them are a knowing decision to embrace violence. However, the pairing of pleasure and fear is ultimately a confusing experience for young humans. Older children who watch terrifying movies experience a cocktail of hormones and neuro-transmitters creating an intense experience that their frontal lobe has little moderation over. Older children can mediate partially with the simple understanding that it’s “not real”. However, even if they insist it was “no big deal” the fear and stress or even numbing was fully present in their body during the viewing.
Choice: For the child that encounters media violence or fear unprepared or unwilling, the risk for adverse responses is greater. Knowing the power of peer pressure, you may want to prepare yourself and your child for what to do if they encounter pressure to participate in scary movie night.
Pros and Cons: The argument holds that facing fears can reduce anxiety, however, I have never heard a parent of a child experiencing PTSD indicate how glad they are it is making their child “stronger”. Ironically, while PTSD cases following horror movies are very rare, the actual definition of Post-traumatic Stress in children includes “imagined danger or fear” if it convinces a child that they or someone they love are in real danger. If your child is highly sensitive or imaginative, horror movies may in fact contribute to anxiety. Alternatively, there are many movies exploring age-appropriate fears and challenges that can help your child explore and overcome anxieties.
