Why has it been believed for the past sixty years that mass panic followed the 1938 broadcast of War of the Worlds? How have sociologists reconstructed the event to offer evidence that perhaps there wasn't such a response to this event?

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

The panic of 1938 may have been an invention of the media. A few reports of an alien attack in progress were called into radio stations which were reported on the air. But verification of these attacks was impossible, especially by the slow-moving media of 1938. There were no action cams or individuals on the scene. People have always been more prone to believe the unusual and bizarre than the mundane truth if they are presented side-by-side. To enforce the theory that there was not a mass panic during the 1938 broadcast, sociologists monitored reports of a pending nuclear disaster reported by Swedish radio in 1973. Although some people became frightened and some fled, most people continued their routine activities. Swedish radio, however, reported the people to be panicking.