Perception in War of the Worlds

Perception in War of the Worlds

Back in the early 1900’s, radio was one of the most popular ways of communication. The general public relied on the radio to give them the latest news around the country. Particularly, in 1938 the world turned upside down when broadcaster Orson Welles mislead his audience by deceiving them, giving them false information that caused nationwide panic. In Welles’ delivery, there were some mistakes in perception, which lead the listeners to genuinely believe what they were hearing. Perception is described as “the process of selecting, organizing, and interpreting data from our senses.” These mistakes in perception include, tone in the storytelling technique the audience heard, what the listeners saw and how the sense of sight manipulated them, and lastly the details and how it affected their thoughts.

The tone and storytelling techniques used definitely affected how the listeners heard and processed the information. It is said in the documentary that the script was purposefully written to mimic a real emergency broadcast. So the listeners just heard a lot of fast paced talking, and loads of information which translated in their mind as something very serious and breaking news.

The listeners’ sense of sight was also manipulated, making it the second mistake that lead them to believe what they were hearing was a true story. It is stated in the documentary that “people would look out their windows and see no cars, and think that everyone left, so they would panic and leave.” People go by what other people do, this is an action most people cannot control. If someone sees someone panicking about something - in this case a nationwide crisis, they will start to panic and act upon it as well.

Lastly, the details they were given manipulated their senses, causing them to fall for wrong information. The language used and the details Welles used when describing the event