Questionnaire results

Psychographic question answers

Have you experienced any supernatural event?

Over half of the people who I asked to fill out my questionnaire have said that they had either experienced or hear about supernatural events happens to their friends or family. A majority of the encounters are to do with hearing footsteps, doors slamming or things being knocked over; some of them are to do with children. Only one person claimed to have seen their deceased uncle.

Someone talked about how they visited Bodmin Gool and her son started to scream hysterically when they entered one room and then calmed down instantly when they left the room. Three of them talk about how either them or siblings used to say strange things when they were children. She said that she used to have an “imaginary friend” who would tell her facts about World War 2 and she’d then recite them and they’d be correct. She also said that at the age of 3 her “imaginary friend” would tell her complex words that she’d use when she spoke and she understood what they meant. The 3^rd story about children was a woman who said that her younger sister would come out with weird statements. She walked into the room and said “aunt Lucy’s dead” and they thought nothing of it, since she wasn’t, then the next day they got a phone call saying that she had passed away. She said that when she was a child her mum was driving and nearly hit a car at a junction. A few weeks later, at the same junction, she was in the car with her mum and said “What out for the car mummy!” and there weren’t any other cars there.

Another story was that this woman’s sister couldn’t sleep so she came into bed with her and her younger sister kept saying “who’s the lady in the pink dress” and pointing at the end of the bed.

Most of these are about things happening in their own homes, a few of them being them now living in a house where the previous owner had died and now doors slam, things fall, lights flicker, and they can hear footsteps.

What are you biggest fears?

Some people had some odd fears e.g. Polystyrene, windows on upper floors, different textures, things with holes in. A couple were about ghosts and Ouija boards. A few fears where more emotional fears; one being someone not wanting to outlive their own children, loosing control, saying goodbye. There were the common fears that a lot of people had: clowns, the unknown, spiders, and cockroaches.

I think that the people who had fears linked to their emotions had more a more genuine fear because they went in depth about them, rather than those who just wrote down “spiders.” Those who did I think that there fears are more about being disgusted by something rather than having a fear of it. Seeing something that has a usual texture is more about them being shocked by it rather than being fearful of it. I can take the general fears and use them in my poster campaign ideas, but the ones that are emotional I can base the idea of the film around them.

What makes a horror film poster effective? (Other box selected and discussed)

People who had selected the other box wanted to see something that’s based on real life events/ new threats/ not over doing the jumps scare factor. A couple of people want posters to have a sense of mystery to them and seeing the monster emerging or seeing something surreal.

When you watch a supernatural horror film what do you expect?

Lots of people liked the conventions of supernatural horror films; gore, playing on the real world, jump scares, plot twists, and some people said that they enjoy them having bad endings, one person said that they liked the archetype of a blond bimbo in horror films. Suspense was the biggest expectation for supernatural horror films and seeing disturbing images. I think this is because, from my secondary research, people want to see and experience the things that they don’t have/ try to avoid in their own persona lives.

Analysis of demographic questions

Lots of people fell into the age grouping of 16-18 and they were the people who most commonly watch horror films, in my focus group I will ask them if they tend to watch 15 rated horror or 18 rated; because I think that teenagers have a fascination of graphic horror films and I’d like to hear about it in more depth. My questionnaire was more female dominant and most of the males who answered it didn’t watch horror films as much. Which I find interesting because stereotypically you’d think that males would want to watch horror films more. For my focus group I will chose people who are between the ages 16-18 because I feel that it's a more appropriate age group for horror films.  

The most favoured sub-genres of horror films were gore and supernatural. I believe this could be because they’re the two that are very far from reality, yet the two genres play on real life events.

A majority of people used to tell ghost stories when they were teenagers. The ones they told were mostly about real life events and the most common one heard was Bloody Mary and he disappearing Hitchhiker. These two ghost stories are based in the real world and are to do with seeing a ghost. Rather than the stories that were about a human being the antagonist, e.g Humans can lick too and the clown statue. From my secondary research and this questionnaire people like to hear stories about real life events and most supernatural horror films are about true events that have happened.  

People said that the poster does make an impact on whether they’d see the film or not, and the most common thing they thought made it effective was low lighting. Everything else was about level. Lots of people liked to see a bit of gore or the monster. Out of the two posters I showed them, Poltergeist and Sinister, people said that they would rather see Sinister. Which shows that people do like to see a bit of gore in the poster, maybe this is because it’s clearer that it’s a horror film and they know what they’re going to see. I chose two posters that were opposites to see if people would go for the classic gore poster for a horror film or the one that suggested horror and had a child in it.