It seems like these days the world is full of things to be afraid of. If you ask most people what they’re afraid of, you get responses like: global warming, needles, public speaking, nuclear war, tornadoes, or maybe losing a loved one or a friend.
But if you go to the movies, or “stream” the movies/TV shows, horror movies or TV programs aren’t usually about those fears — they’re usually about dolls or sharks, or maybe clowns.
A phobia is an intense fear of a certain object or scenario that impacts behavior and sometimes daily life. Phobias are often deep-rooted psychological responses tied to some traumatic event in the person’s past.
I read a magazine article a few days ago that discussed a survey conducted by Chapman University. According to the survey, 7.8 percent of Americans suffer from coulrophobia — a fear of clowns. And — it can be a debilitating fear. I might note that coulrophobia isn’t an officially recognized phobia. I guess if you think about it, the fear of clowns must be real and fairly widespread…. it’s even inspired it’s own “word” to describe it.
Our son, Dave, while not afraid of clowns, isn’t particularly fond of them either. I remember the first time we took him to the circus, he was anxiously looking around and asking where the clowns were… even before we got inside.
In theory, clowns are figures of fun, intended to produce amusement and laughter with their hijinks — not screams of horror. When you think of clowns, you envision big smiley faces, party tricks, slapstick, bright colors, funny costumes, etc. None of these things are typically associated with intense fear. While doing my usual extensive research on clowns, I ran across a term I hadn’t heard before — “uncanny valley.” First of all we have to remember that clowns are people. People in elaborate/funny costumes, but people nonetheless. So, they have human bodies and faces, like everyone else. But that is where the problem(s) come in.
The “uncanny valley” effect is a phenomenon where things that look human but “aren’t quite there” are incredibly unsettling. It appears to be a fundamental reflex. If you put a pair of google eyes on a sock, you’ve got yourself a lovable puppet that nobody has any issue with — but a highly realistic android with an almost-but not-quite-identical face to that of a real human is often very frightening. Ventriloquist dummies also have a similar “scary” reputation like clowns, likely for this very reason.
One theory is that they make us think of death and corpses (a dead face looks like a normal one but “behaves” differently.) Anyhow, for whatever reason, human faces that deviate from the norm are upsetting.
And it’s not just the face — humans are very sensitive to body shape, and movement. We (subconsciously) glean an incredible amount of information just from the way someone walks. We are sensitive to all aspects of a person’s walk such as posture, stance and gait. Clowns throw all this out of whack with their exaggerated tumbling and walking. All these things make clowns upsetting, just by their existence, for many people.
The unpredictability of clowns may be another reason for “clown phobia.” If you go to a circus, most things are predictable… jugglers juggle, acrobats perform impressive stunts, wild animal tamers tame wild animals, and clowns clown around. But clowns don’t always clown around as expected — they do things that defy normal behavior. That unpredictability is something that causes a knee-jerk distrust and apprehension in many humans.
Stephen King once said that nobody likes a clown at midnight — for a lot of people, that probably applies to any time of day.
— 30 —