Urban legends are tales of real and mystical events, usually associated with some places or objects in the urban environment. Recently, psychologists at the University of Durham (UK) concluded that people are more likely to memorize stories related to human relationships than, say, monsters or something supernatural.
The study involved 60 volunteers aged 18-52 years. They were divided into several groups. The first group was introduced to a list of popular urban legends, and then asked to select the most interesting stories from the list and retell them to the second group. The second group had to retell them the third, the third - the fourth, and so on …
Here are some of the plots. In 2003, a strange humanoid creature appeared in the United States, which was nicknamed "Rake". Many people saw him. Some of the researchers even unearthed information about him in the archives of the XII century.
One woman said that she woke up in the middle of the night next to her husband and found that they had a creature at their feet that looked like a large bald dog.
For some time the creature looked at them in silence, and then jumped up and rushed towards the nursery. Running in there, the couple found their little daughter covered in blood in her crib. With the words: "It was Rake" she died … The monster simply disappeared.
Another legend tells of a man who rented a hotel room. Handing him the keys to the room, the hostess warned him not to try to enter or look into a room without a number, which is located not far from his room. She said that this room is locked and various things are stored there …
Of course, the hostess's words aroused the guest's curiosity. On the second night, he went to the forbidden door and began to pull the handle. Of course, she didn't give in. Then he decided to look through the keyhole and saw the most ordinary hotel room. In the corner stood a woman, her head leaning against the wall … The man noticed that the guest had very light skin. After that he went to his room.
On the third night, our hero decided to look through the keyhole again. But he saw nothing but a thick red color … He thought that the guest had something to plug the well, realizing that she was being spied on.
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Intrigued, the guest began to ask the hostess about the mysterious room. He had to admit that he looked through the keyhole. Sighing, the woman said that many years ago a husband and wife stayed in the same room, and one night the husband killed his wife … Since then, her ghost has been living in the room. He is very pale, but his eyes are red as blood … This must be the last time our hero saw the eye of a ghost, clung to the well …
Another story. One married couple decided to go to a party. Since the children stayed at home, the couple hired an hourly nanny. When the children fell asleep, the girl wanted to watch TV, but it was only in the matrimonial bedroom, and she called the owners on the cell phone asking if she could watch TV in their bedroom. The owners allowed it. But after a while the nanny called again and asked if she could use something to close the statue of an angel, which makes her very nervous. Hearing this, the head of the family paused, and then ordered the nanny to urgently take the children out of the house and call the police. The fact is that there was no statue of an angel in the house …
When the police arrived, they found both the nanny and the children dead, lying in a pool of blood. There was no statue in the bedroom …
As it turned out, people most often chose, retold and memorized stories related not to ghosts or some kind of monsters, but to their own kind. So, in the first place were stories about relationships, for example, about a girl who had virtual sex with some man, and then discovered that it was her father, and in the second - about the dangers associated with people - say, about a woman. who heard a child crying outside the window and, having called the police, found out that in this way a maniac was luring his victims … "Supernatural" horror stories were only in the last place.
What is the reason for this? Study leader Joseph Stubbersfield believes that a person is more interested in two types of information that can be called "social": one that will help to survive in a difficult situation and the one that concerns relationships with other people. Therefore, he is more likely to choose stories belonging to these two types, and not about the monster that attacks people at night and not about the ghost that appears at the hotel at midnight …
Stubbersfield and his colleagues presented their findings in the British Journal of Psychology. True, it is not yet clear what practical significance they can have - unless they will induce journalists to write more about real things, and not about mysticism …