It works every time. Irreparably, you jump. Whether it’s watching a movie, playing a video game or even listening to a horror podcast, you jump as soon as the author, screenwriter or designer has had the subtle idea of placing a jump scare in his work. .However, the use of jump scare is far from new, some attribute the first occurrence to Mark Robson, editor on the film Cat People (1942). This process was also called the “Lewton Bus”, named after producer Val Lewton. Attention, it’s violent (no): Since then, horror films of the 1980s or video games like Five Nights at Freddy’s have multiplied this effect. In reality, the jump scare, beyond the narrative process, dates back to the dawn of time, to the origins of humanity. The jump that our body produces in the face of danger is an evolutionary trait common to most mammals. Such a reaction is perfectly natural, and even rather reassuring as to your survival instinct. Most jump scares take place in two parts: a first, calm, during the body is not “on the lookout” for danger and which is suddenly interrupted by a vision, a sound or a contact as intense as sudden. It almost never fails: you jump. Natural survival reflex The jump scare makes total sense from the point of view of our brain. It’s your dear amygdala, responsible for processing fear and anxiety, which is activated. Faced with immediate danger, it sends the signal to the hypothalamus (in charge of hormones) which will secrete adrenaline in your muscles: you jump. Why so quickly? Because it is most often a sensory reaction (sight, hearing, touch), yet the small number of synapses through which the neural processing of this type of information passes means that it is almost immediate, 20 about milliseconds. Unlike a situation of anxiety where fear could rise more crescendo (being phobic of the plane at the time of takeoff for example), jump scares have the particularity of being punctual and immediate. In physiology, this reaction is logically related to the concept of “fight-flight response”, it is the first stage of adaptation to stress in the animal kingdom. Faced with danger, there are often two possible choices: confront it or flee it. Either way, it demands a response from your body, and your brain will always make sure your muscles are awake and your heart is ready to put in the effort (that’s why it’s beating at 130 right now- the). A German study suggested the choice of a third way, that of sociability, but clearly, faced with a screamer, you don’t want to discuss. works of fiction, one would have thought that one would have become accustomed to them. Yet in most cases, no matter how much we expect it, it does: we jump. Sometimes more weakly, but it is very really very complicated to prevent the slightest start. We know, however, that the killer will land in front of the camera at this moment T, that the music will be strident or that this hand will suddenly close on the hero. Even when you’ve already seen the film, when you know the exact moment, you’re fooled and this also concerns regulars of horror movies or games, although they are used to these processes. In reality, the fact that you expectation can largely work against you. And for that we go back to our amygdala story. This part of the brain does not activate at the time of the jump scare but well before. The stressful music, the low light, the anxiety-provoking context, all of this contributes to the preparation of the jump scare. Faced with a growing threat, your amygdala is already stimulated and therefore the reaction will only be stronger. Doctor Christian Grillon, psychophysiologist who studies fear and anxiety in humans, explained his feedback from experiments to the magazine Reverse. It elicited “frightening” stimuli to human guinea pigs and, in the case where the subjects had been subjected to a previously anxious state, the “startle reflexes are increased by 100 to 300%“. This also applies to people who are more anxious than average, those with post-traumatic stress disorder are even much more likely to jump – even if the jump scare has nothing to do with the trauma in question. Our distant ancestors interpreted fear as a danger. Today, we sometimes try to recreate it for our pleasure by inflicting horror games and films on ourselves, so, obviously, our brain will do what is expected of it: make us jump. You may be on top Vigilance and waiting with a clenched fist for this cursed jump scare, your brain will not be mistaken: you had to (wanted?) to be afraid, you will be afraid.
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