Aprikyan in Chicago. Thank you for joining us as we go
on a mission of discovery searching for the ans
behind the headlines. If you watch true crime
entertainment, you're part of a large group of people
who indulge in that genre. According to the media
tracking company, parrot analyt True crime is the
biggest documentary sub genre across the entire
streaming industry. The number of series skyrocketed by
63% between 2018 and 2021 demands for new content
jumped 142% in that same time period. So why are people
so obsessed from a charming serial killer in the ted
Bundy tapes just doesn't look like the type to kill
somebody to an eccentric lover of wild animals plotting
his violent revenge in Tiger King. Will you go to
florida and filled up already Our morbid fascination
with real life horror dates back centuries in the 1500s
British writers wrote about violent crimes and
punishments in pamphlets and sold them to the public.
People once bought tickets to public hangings in the
19th century And the real life mysteries on NBC's
Dateline have captivated televi viewers for over 30
years now, But in 2014 1 podcast began a new era of
true crime intrigue. It's seria one story told week by
week, I'm Sarah Koenig in cereals. First season
journalist, Sara Koenig investigated whether high
school students Adnan Syed actually murdered his ex
girlfriend, Hae min lee at the time, the podcast became
the fastest to reach more than five million download
on itunes. Even late night talk shows like the Colbert
report were excited about the podcast. What does it
mean to have the most popular podcast in history Do y
get paid in Itunes gift cards What is your, I'm trying
to follow the money here to date listeners have
downloaded cereals first season more than 300 million
times the year after the podcast success, Netflix tr
its hand at binge able true crime steven Avery spent 1
years in prison for something he didn't do More than 19
million people watched the hit series making a murderer
within the first month after its debut according to the
streaming service, one psychologist told NPR our
obsession with true crime is actually normal and
healthy. To a point, he said that's because true crime
stories appeal to our innate curiosity and interest i
good versus evil. Being curious about the mind of a
killer is also why women in particular may be more
interested icrn ime than men. In 2010, the University
of Illinois found women wrote 70% of Amazon reviews of
true Crime Books. They also make up 75% of true crime
podcast listeners, according to a 2018 survey, experts
say the genre might comfort women as they learn how to
defend against an attacker or survive a dangerous
situation. One police psycholog says we may also be
drawn to the adrenaline rush. True crime provides along
with a sense of relief that we're not in danger first
is a sense of not me, This feeling of I'm interes
but I'm interested because it calms me that I'm not the
victim. But true crime may be booming nowse of
our binge culture. In a 2017 study, researchers found
nearly three quarters of Americans have binged content.
Some Watching for five hours at a time. Crime is the
perfect binge. According to anthropologisGrt ant
Mccracken, he says it allows us to escape into a world
completely different than our own. The pandemic also
elevated our intrigue as we sat at home, bored and
restless criminology Professor scott Bond writes true
crime allows us to play investigator and fills the
human love of solving puzzles. Just take crime con for
example, Since 2017, thousands of people from regular
fans to celebrities like Selena Gomez Flock to the
massive true crime convention Tickets run up to $1600
for the chance to hear from favorite podcasters and TV
stars or even get nancy grace to autograph a wine
bottle featuring missing person cases. But even with
the growing obsession, experts aren't worried about us
getting desensitized to crime. Crime and conflict is an
aspect of the human condition that's been with us from
the beginning, it will always be with us and to think,
you know, there are plenty who argue that true crime is
exploitative and that violence shouldn't be used as a
form of entertainment and in fact if you watch too much
of it, it can start to affect your mental health
studies have shown it can give you a sense that there
is murder all around you or make you afraid of violence,
even though actual crime rates are dropping. Let's get
a deeper understanding of both the appeal and the
impact on our brains. Diane Barth is a psychotherapis
and psychoanalyst. She has a private practice in new
york and has published a lot on this topic. Diane.
Thank you for coming on the show. Oh, it's my pleasure.
Thanks for having me. Let's start by looking at the
psychology of people's interest in true crime. You say
that watching other people's painful situations, se
them face their own fears and demons can help us
process our own. Can you expand on that a little bit
for us You're saying our brains do that because we're
programmed to try and figure out things to make
ourselves feel better. Right. R I I mean, one of
the things that I think it's like everything, it'
complicated, but one of the things that happens is that
we feel that as somebody else is working someth
through, we identify with them. We we experienced some
of the same issues that they're going through and we
think um it's a way of feeling like we're working
through some of those issues ourselves. You wrote an op
ed for NBC in it. You got insight from lots of people
who watch these types of programs, what stood out to
you in those conversations. But actually the thing that
was the most interesting to me was how many people
talked about feeling soothed buy them. One woman talked
about that she would sleep, she'd go to sleep at night
after she had watched one um or after she watched True
Crime. And I think it really was about this idea that
um um I think one of the people I interviewed, Ke
soo Taconic said that um a writer friend of hers, Neil
Gaiman talked about how Children know that there are
dragons in the world. What they want is for us to be
able to reassure them that the dragons can be conquered.
And I think the true crime gives people a sense that
you know, bad things do happen, we all know that. But
um that when a bad thing happens, that people have
of surviving people have ways of getting through and
that sometimes the bad guy gets caught and and um um
that helps. But even when the bad guy doesn't get
caught, there's a way of surviving this, this kind of
experience that that's interest because I think most
people who watch true crime may see it in that way of,
there's a justice involved in that. Whereas maybe
people who aren't into those types of series or genres
maybe have a fear of it. So that's an interesting
distinction um that your research is showing there.
There's a lot of crime shows out there and even shows
or series targeted to kids or teens and those can often
also be very violent. How does that impact the brain of
younger kids if they start getting into those kinds of
series You know, there's a lot of questions about how
it impacts the brains of kids that, you know, are are
sort of gut feeling is to say kids watch violence, it
makes them more violent. There' not a huge amount of
research that actually confirms that, but um, what I
think is that the most important thing is to help kids
be able to find ways to manage the feelings that get
stirred up when they see something like this. So, um,
this is not true crime, but when, when 9 11 happened,
my son was a young kid and but he was way past the age
of Sesame Street, but he went to Sesame Street to sort
of calm himself and soothe himself and feel better. And
I think that that's the thing that we really have to
watch with with Children is if they get overly see if
they get overstimulated, if they get upset, we, you
know, the adults can see that this is something that
they need help processing. Not, not necessarily that
they should never watch it, but that they need help
figuring out how to manage the feelings that gets
stirred up. So then what can we do as parents if let's
say our Children are watching these things or we're
noticing maybe they're now a little more frightened or
they're having trouble sleeping because of something
they watch. How do we help them process that We have
them talk to us about it, the more they can talk about
it, the more they can tell us about what they're
feeling and what's upsetting them, the less they are
likely to act on those feelings. But also it's really
important for us to tell them that they don't have to
watch it if it's too scary. They really don't need t
watch it. And there there are um more and more
fortunately um situations in schools where kids are
told if they cannot handle a story that's being read or
they can't handle a movie that's being shown that they
can walk, they're allowed to leave the room, they have
to do it with you know approval from the teacher
they don't have to stay there and be more and more
upset by something. They they they um they have
permission to get out of that situation. And I think
that's really our job as parents is to teach our kids
that when something is to start to read their own cues
when something's upsetting them to say this is more
than I want to be looking at right now or I don't want
to be talking about this or thinking about this or
watching this and and to turn the tv off or turn the
computer off or leave the room or tell their friends
that they're gonna they're gonna if they're with
friends they're gonna go out r a walk and they'll be
back or however they can do it or just they want to go
into another room. Well, what about reading our own
cues as adults or those who are fans of this genre What
are some of the boundaries they should look for in
terms of how it's affecting them Well, that's a great
question because because one of the things that I heard
often when I was talking to people is that these are
the very same thing that can be soothing can also be
distressing to somebody who is a survivor for example
or somebody who is or even if you're not a survivor,
but you're just this is upsetti to you. Um So on the
one hand, um just as well, I'm suggesting that we te
our Children it's important to be able to say to
yourself, this is not good for me tonight. This is
upsetting me tonight. I'm not I don't think I'm gonna
watch this, but it's also really important to have a
community of people you can tal to. So a lot of people
are true crime fans in secret. They don't I mean that'
one of things I loved about that saturday night live
skit that um it's it's people feel like they're alone.
They're doing it themselves and it's sort of hidden and,
but there are a lot of people who are watching thes
things and it's useful to talk to other people who are
watching them, who are processing them, who have maybe
had some kind of similar experiences. Um, so those are,
we can read our own cues by both, by both paying
attention to what we're feeling and then also talking
with other people and finding out what they're feelin
and how they're dealing with it. Let me ask you this,
What impact do these series have on the families who
are affected by these crimes These are real life cases.
It may seem far removed for the people who are watching
them, but this is someone else's life has been changed
forever by these incidents. Yeah. Yeah. I think that
it's a range of things some people felt really healed
by at least of the people that I read about that I was
able to contact that there was some feeling of healing
for some people and other people felt that it reopened
old wounds. And um, I think again, the people who mak
I did, I didn't talk to anybody who actually makes
these, these shows. So I don't know what they're um,
thinking is and how they do it, but I think that for
families, it's really important to, to protect
themselves if there if this is not good for them. Um,
they need to find a way to protect themselves from
having this uh Material out. Their data from the
University of South Carolina showed that women are 75%
of the listeners of true crime podcasts. What did you
notice from your research about who is listening or
watching true crime I think that statistic may be
surprising to a lot of people watching this. It's
actually not surprising to me because I think that, you
know, women are often victims of of um some kind of
domestic violence or some kind of violence that that
they are helpless to defend themselves against. And
that's what true crime um is about. It's about that
feeling of being helpless and um and and not being able
to defend yourself in a particular situation. That's
I think that there are plenty of men who have similar
feelings and similar experience and it doesn't have to
be for men or women, it doesn't have to be an
experience of having been actually a victim or a
survivor of an attack. It's it can be just a general
feeling of helplessness in life Um I found that there
were men who were to crime fans who were really
secretive about. I mean that they were they when they
admitted it to me, it was like they hadn't told anybo
else. Um So I don't know, you know, the the statist
doesn't surprise me, but I also think there there are
some plenty of men out there who don't acknowledge
Yeah, Okay. Diane Barth. Really interesting insig
there. Thank you so much for coming on. The y thank you.