Background information for the social bedate on fear in society.
Here follow the four factors of Chermak, who claims they increase our levels of fear.
• Mass media are the main access to information for us. Obviously, people turn to TV, newspapers and radio to get informed about a terrorist attack or other violent act in society.
• The public fails to think critically and don’t further investigate what these media say. Unaware that the information presents only a part of the whole story, the public regards the information as true, objective and complete. But it is not.
• Media bring news framed and selective; they filter their information to create a sort of order and shape the situation (terrorist threat or other social crisis) for better understanding by the public.
• The incident receives a lot media attention, blowing the subject out of proportions and exaggerating the actual danger. Another writer speaks of a “media preoccupation” of brutal violence, which results in either tedious repeating happenings in the news or the over-analysis with various perspectives in a form of entertainment, like videos, games of films. The story told in the media then looses touch with reality and we become afraid of a threat that is hardly as big as portrayed in the media.
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