Peoples perception of fear: The Conjuring

The Conjuring 2013 directed by James Wan, depicts the story of two people Ed and Lorraine Warren, who are paranormal investigators.

The film follows the story of a family who find themselves living on cursed land, where a witch who owned the land swore vengeance on all future residents after she failed to kill her child, she possess the mothers to kill the children in order to conjure conduit spirits to come from hell in to the world of the living.

The film in itself does not have scenes that are filled with gore but it very tells a story. I have found that with some horror films/ psychological thrillers tend to show extremely violent acts but fail to create a story, or a sense of realism. The Conjuring creates both. The fact that Ed and Lorraine Warren were real people who investigated paranormal events. It establishes a sense of realism, that makes the events very believable and instills a sense of fear that, it is possible, for the events that happened to this family can happen to you, they are not impossible. Even though the debate exists as to whether or not ghosts and the paranormal even exist, these rely strongly on what people believe.
I did a small study to see how this effect the fear created by films like the Conjuring effect and influence the people that watch them. I asked two questions.

The first was

What do you fear more rapists or ghosts?

What do you fear more in a film context rapists or ghosts?

Out of the people that I asked, in a real world context they stated that they were more afraid of rapists than ghosts, due to reasons such as;
-the people asked did not believe in ghosts
-that (especially with the people I asked who were female) they fear those who they do not know and are aware that anyone can attack you
-For those who do believe that ghosts exist, these particular people also believe that they cannot hurt you and share the belief: Don't fear the dead, fear the living.

However as the results show when asked in a film context what do you fear most Rapists or ghosts?
Most answered ghosts, the reasons that they gave were ones such as;
-In films ghosts are harder to fight, as in a film a rapist is human and can be stopped by being; arrested, or even killed. Where as the most common solution to stopping Ghosts are exorcisms, which are harder to perform and like in the Conjuring are shown to not always work.
-Ghosts are not visible and can attack you from anywhere
-Ghosts are shown to be departed, lost spirits who will go to any length to reach their goal.

For those who said that they were still more afraid of Rapists than ghosts gave reasons such as;
-Even though the film is fictitious the film depicts that something that can happen in real life.

Films like The Conjuring work on fears that make us very afraid when we watch films however films based on the paranormal allow us a certain safety blanket when watching them, in the belief that as much as a sense of realism is created many people who watch these films do not proclaim to have seen ghosts, and do not believe that ghosts can harm them in real life. Where as rapists can hurt them in real life and in films that depict sexual violence, tend to test peoples boundaries when watching these films, as well as making people more paranoid as to the fact that rapists do exist.