An outbreak of fatal dancing fits among members of the same \ncommunity, men suddenly gripped by the sickening fear of losing their \ngenital organs, and teenagers having mysterious symptoms after watching \nan episode of their favorite TV series \u2014 these are all instances of what\n we often refer to as \u201cmass hysteria.\u201d
\noverhead shot of crowd
\nWhat is mass hysteria, and how does it manifest? We investigate.
\n\u201cThey danced together, ceaselessly, for hours or days, and in wild \ndelirium, the dancers collapsed and fell to the ground exhausted, \ngroaning and sighing as if in the agonies of death. When recuperated, \nthey [\u2026] resumed their convulsive movements.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This is a description of the epidemic of \u201cdancing plague\u201d or \u201cdancing\n mania\u201d as given by Benjamin Lee Gordon in Medieval and Renaissance \nMedicine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
These events were spontaneous outbursts of uncontrollable dancing \nmotions that gripped people in communities across Europe in the Middle \nAges.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Those affected would often reportedly be unable to stop dancing until\n they were so worn out and exhausted that they died. These events are \ntypically cited as some of the first known instances of what would come \nto be referred to as \u201cmass hysteria.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mass hysteria is a phrase that is used so often and so imprecisely to\n refer to anything from giving in to fashion fads to participating in \nriots and raves that it has become something of a fluid concept, \nsynonymous with anything with a negative connotation that involves the \nparticipation of a large group of people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
However, though sometimes contested as a useful, valid concept, mass \nhysteria \u2014 in its more restrictive sense \u2014 lives at the intersection of \npsychology and sociology.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As such, it has received some rigorous attention from specialists over the years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What is mass hysteria?
\nIn order to provide a clearer definition of mass hysteria, to outline it\n as an event of potential clinical interest, and to distance it from any\n unduly negative connotations, researchers have actually advised \nreferring to the phenomenon as \u201ccollective obsessional behavior.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Specialists who have taken an interest in this phenomenon say that it\n is a type of \u201cpsychogenic illness\u201d \u2014 that is, a condition that begins \nin the mind, rather than in the body. Physiological symptoms, however, \nare often not illusory but very much real.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mass hysteria is also described as a \u201cconversion disorder,\u201d in which a\n person has physiological symptoms affecting the nervous system in the \nabsence of a physical cause of illness, and which may appear in reaction\n to psychological distress.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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\nBecause mass hysteria, or collective obsessional behavior, can take so \nmany different forms, it is very difficult to provide a clear definition\n for it, or to characterize it with confidence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In a seminal article he published on this topic, Prof. Simon Wessley \u2014\n from King\u2019s College London in the United Kingdom \u2014 also notes that mass\n hysteria has been used to describe such \u201c[a] wide variety of crazes, \npanics, and abnormal group beliefs\u201d that defining it is particularly \ntricky.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Still, he suggests that in characterizing a phenomenon as an instance\n of mass hysteria, we should aim to guide ourselves by five principles:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
that \u201cit is an outbreak of abnormal illness behavior that cannot be explained by physical disease\u201d
\nthat \u201cit affects people who would not normally behave in this fashion\u201d
\nthat \u201cit excludes symptoms deliberately provoked in groups gathered for \nthat purpose,\u201d such as when someone intentionally gathers a group of \npeople and convinces them that they are collectively experiencing a \npsychological or physiological symptom
\nthat \u201cit excludes collective manifestations used to obtain a state of \nsatisfaction unavailable singly, such as fads, crazes, and riots\u201d
\nthat \u201cthe link between the [individuals experiencing collective \nobsessional behavior] must not be coincidental,\u201d meaning, for instance, \nthat they are all part of the same close-knit community
\nProf. Wessley also believes that mass hysteria should not be confused \nwith \u201cmoral panic.\u201d This is a sociological concept that refers to the \nphenomenon of masses of people becoming distressed about a perceived \u2014 \nusually unreal or exaggerated \u2014 threat portrayed in catastrophizing \nterms by the media.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Different types of mass hysteria?
\nIn his article, Prof. Wessley goes even further, arguing that \u2014 based on\n the instances of mass hysteria documented in specialized literature \u2014 \nthis phenomenon actually refers to two \u201csyndromes\u201d with somewhat \ndifferent characteristics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He calls these two types of collective obsessional behavior \u201cmass anxiety hysteria\u201d and \u201cmass motor hysteria.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The first kind, he says, is marked by physiological symptoms \nconsistent with those experienced in the case of anxiety. These can \ninclude: abdominal pain, chest tightness, dizziness, fainting, \nheadaches, hyperventilation, nausea, and heart palpitations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The second kind of mass hysteria, on the other hand, is characterized\n by seizure-like events (pseudoseizures), apparent partial paralysis \n(pseudoparesis), or other symptoms that alter a person\u2019s motor function \nin a specific way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Are women most affected?
\nMedical sociologist Robert Bartholomew has reviewed some of the most \nprominent cases of mass hysteria in his book Little Green Men, Meowing \nNuns and Head-Hunting Panics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
woman with broken mirror
\nAre women more likely to be affected by collective obsessional behavior?
\nHis research seems to indicate one thing: that instances of mass hysteria are most prominently experienced by groups of women.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But why would that be the case? And does it mean that women are \nsomehow \u201chardwired\u201d to fall prey to such mass \u201cepidemics?\u201d Some \nresearchers argue that women may be more exposed to collective \nobsessional behavior because they are typically exposed to more \nstressful situations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Physical symptoms of disease could provide a nonconfrontational way \nout of an overwhelming situation. Bartholomew notes, for example, that \nin a stressful or even abusive work context, mass hysteria and its \naccompanying symptoms can provide a means of putting up resistance and \nforging a way out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Similarly, Christian Hempelmann \u2014 from Texas A&M \nUniversity-Commerce \u2014 who has taken an interest in mass hysteria, \nsuggests that these group manifestations are effective and \nnonconfrontational.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe way [\u2026] to get out of [an oppressive situation] is to show \nsymptoms of disease and to be allowed not to have to endure the \nsituation any longer,\u201d he believes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
However, the word \u201chysteria\u201d itself is fraught with problems and has a\n \u201cbumpy,\u201d highly controversial history. It is derived from the Greek \nword \u201chystera,\u201d meaning \u201cuterus,\u201d thereby attaching the condition \nspecifically to women.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Uses of the word have historically been so imprecise, and the term \nhas gained such negative connotations \u2014 used to describe any violent \noutburst of emotion \u2014 that it was \u201cretired\u201d by the American Psychiatric \nAssociation in 1952.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cHysteria\u201d is no longer used to describe any existent psychological \ncondition, and more specific terms are instead employed to refer to a \nwide range of conditions that fell, in the past, under the large \numbrella of this name.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As a consequence of this, any claims that mass hysteria could be a \nphenomenon that applies most prominently to women becomes questionable, \nespecially considering the heterogeneous nature of such events and how \ndifficult it is to categorize them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Recent instances of mass hysteria
\nThough occurrences of mass hysteria have been documented throughout \nhistory, they do not seem to have become less common with the passage of\n time and the advent of technology that supports the rapid flux of \ninformation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A number of intriguing events involving collective experiences of \npsychological and physiological symptoms have been referred to as \ninstances of mass hysteria over the past 50 years or so. And some of the\n most recent occurrences have even been tied to the perils of social \nmedia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Laughter epidemics and penis panics
\nIn 1962, in a village in Tanganyika \u2014 now Tanzania \u2014 a girl at a \nboarding school suddenly started laughing\u2026and was unable to stop. Her \nlaughing fit quickly produced a \u201claughing epidemic\u201d among her \nschoolmates, which became of such magnitude that the school had to be \nshut down.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
children laughing
\nA \u2018laughing epidemic\u2019 that started in a school in 1962 \u2018eventually spread to the larger population.\u2019
\nUpon sending all the girls home, the epidemic spread to the wider \ncommunity, and it only began to fade after 2 years from the start of the\n outbreak.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Notoriously, in Singapore in 1967, hundreds of men became convinced \nthat eating pork meat taken from a series of vaccinated pigs would lead \nto penis shrinkage or disappearance, and potentially death.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This \u201cpenis panic,\u201d or \u201ckoro,\u201d required a concerted effort from the \ncountry\u2019s government to educate the male population about their genital \norgans to convince them that their conviction was not, and could not, be\n true.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In autumn 2001, children in elementary and middle schools across the \nUnited States experienced a strange symptom: their skin would break out \nin rashes, but only while they were in school. At home, their symptoms \nwould promptly disappear.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In the media, this phenomenon was linked to the impact of the tragic \nevents of September 11, and the children\u2019s symptoms were taken as a mass\n psychosomatic reaction to the feelings associated with trauma that \npermeated the U.S. at the time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The impact of mass media and social media?
\nMore recently, in 2006, teenagers in Portugal started to present to hospital with dizziness, rashes, and breathing difficulties.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
phone illustrating social media concept
\nNowadays, social media may contribute to the spread of collective obsessional behavior.
\nAfter the doctors could find no physical cause for these symptoms, some \ninvestigative work found an intriguing parallel: these were the same \nsymptoms that were experienced by a character in a popular soap opera \nfor young people, Strawberries With Sugar (Morangos com A\u00e7\u00facar, in \nPortugese).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This is why the phenomenon came to be known as the \u201cstrawberries with sugar virus.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Finally, the most fresh instance of alleged mass hysteria took place \nas recently as 2012, when teenage girls from the small town of LeRoy, \nNY, started to exhibit symptoms similar to those seen in Tourette\u2019s \nsyndrome \u2014 such as uncontrollable jerks of the limbs and verbal \noutbreaks \u2014 though the doctors were unable to find a clear cause for \nthem.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This epidemic started when a girl posted a video of herself on \nYouTube, in which she documented an episode of such symptoms. Until \nrecently, this girl had shown no sign of Tourette\u2019s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The video went viral, and many more teenage girls started to display \nthe same symptoms. A teenage boy and a 36-year-old woman were also \n\u201cinfected.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When the woman explained that she started having these symptoms after\n she learned of the girl\u2019s story on Facebook, this led to speculation \nabout social media\u2019s potential role in advancing mass hysteria in the \npresent day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So, is mass hysteria an epidemic of the mind, leading to symptoms in \nthe body, which is spread via social contact? This question is still \nunder debate, but if it is so, the advent of social media is a likely \nvehicle for the spread of such \u201cviruses.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In any case, instances of reported mass hysteria do highlight one \nconsideration: that it is just as important to preserve our inner \nwell-being as it is to look after our physical health.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And the messages we ingest \u2014 through what we read, watch, or hear \u2014 may affect our well-being in unsuspected ways.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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