Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, October 31, 1994 TAG: 9411150010
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BARBARA F. MELTZ BOSTON GLOBE
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
Q: Is it OK to take young children to Halloween haunted houses or theme parks?
A: No. David Bertolino, owner of Spooky World in Berlin, N.H., wisely doesn't recommend his attraction for children under 6. At The House, a haunted house in Holliston, Mass., run by the Montgomery Masonic Lodge, children under 8 are given special glow-sticks so staff members see them coming and know not to ``scare the yell'' out of them, something House spokesmen Russell Smith says is the general idea.
But precautions like these may not be enough.
Smith remembers one 7-year-old who was so scared he ran out of the house, ``and he was only 3 feet into the hallway.''
Malcolm Watson, a professor at Brandeis University who researches children's fantasy play, including supernatural fantasy play, tells parents to keep even older children home from these Halloween productions.
They can be too scary for them, he says, and possibly the cause of bad dreams. But there's something else Watson worries about: That children will become desensitized to blood and gore and horror.
While some parents might argue that desensitization is good, because it helps children cope with all the violence in the real world, Watson takes the opposite view. ``When they get desensitized, they don't react emotionally or care as much as they should when confronted with a real-life situation. That's part of the reason that, as a society, we've come to accept horrific things in the world,'' he says.
Q: But what if a child really likes being scared?
A: No question about it, some children do like to get scared. In fact, says Watson, a certain amount of scariness is healthy and helpful for a child.
``Kids have a love-hate relationship with scariness because they are challenging themselves and testing their skills right at the edge of where they can handle it,'' he says. ``That's what makes it so exciting.''
The problem comes when the thrill and scariness doesn't hit at the right level.
Q: How can we know what that level is?
A: Children under 5, especially 2- and 3-year-olds, are the most susceptible to all forms of Halloween trickery.
Something as simple as a mask can be too scary - not the mask itself necessarily, but the fact that children this age don't always understand that you are still you, behind the mask. Ask trick or treaters, ``Can we see what you look like without your mask?'' And stick to face painting in your family.
Another problem with young children is protecting them from the antics and scariness of older siblings. If a 4-year-old doesn't want to participate, doesn't even want to greet trick or treaters at the door, it's important to make sure older siblings are respectful and understanding. On the other hand, if a preschooler wants to dress up, paint her face and go trick or treating, there's no reason she shouldn't, as long as you recognize that her interest may be more a response to wanting to be like her big sisters than due to her own readiness. Be prepared that something relatively ordinary may scare her.
School-age children can be too scared, too.
Many children relate stories of once having wanted to dress up as a monster or other scary figure and then being too frightened of the costume to wear it. If that happens to your child, let him off the hook comfortably. He can always wear the costume next year.
Peer pressure can make a school-age child want to tolerate something that is actually too scary for him. So even though a 10-year-old may be asking permission to trick or treat without a chaperone, for instance, what he may really want is for you to set a limit.
Perhaps the child who is most vulnerable at Halloween is one of any age who is experiencing some kind of emotional difficulty in his life, including a divorce, illness or death in the family, says Gerald Koocher, chief of psychology at Children's Hospital in Boston.
``If someone just died and you believe in spooks and spirits, Halloween might be unusually provocative,'' he says.
He relates a story of a 7-year-old whose parents had recently divorced. The boy was experiencing lots of difficulty around separation issues and was particularly upset that he couldn't trick or treat with both his parents, as he usually did.
Luckily, says Koocher, the parents recognized that trick or treating would be stressful for him. They suggested that instead of going out, he greet the children who came to his door.
``It worked,'' says Koocher. ``He was excited about being in costume and surprising trick or treaters who came to the door.''
Q: What if my child does get too scared?
A: For the typical child, it's unlikely that a scary aspect of Halloween will carry over into the rest of her life. Says Koocher: ``They know that it's just Halloween. They can walk away from it,'' with the possible exception of having bad dreams.
If a Halloween fright does seem to spread to the rest of a child's life, however, probably something else is troubling her and Halloween was just the stimulus, says Koocher.
Q: What about the scary books third-, fourth- and fifth-graders are devouring, especially the Goosebump series?
A: The 25 books in R.L. Stine's Goosebump series (Scholastic Books) are certainly the hottest titles right now in the growing genre of children's ``thrillers,'' and they seem to know no season, reports Leo Landry of the Children's Book Shop in Brookline, Mass.
Their appeal is probably similar to other Halloween props, that is, that they challenge a child's ability to handle scariness. And make no doubt about it: They are scary.
The publisher's catalog bills them as ``thrillers without blood and gore.'' Landry, who has read a few, describes them as ``pretty grisly.''
But while Landry says they have no redeeming literary value (he calls them ``popcorn reading'') and he doesn't recommend them - in fact, the store didn't even carry Goosebumps until it was overwhelmed with demand - he also doesn't say children shouldn't read them. ``They're not as bad as some of the other ones that are out there,'' he says, including Stine's series for older children, ``Fear Street.'' Landry's hope is that reading them will lead a child to read something else, hopefully with more merit.
by CNB