A lot of strange things have gone down, from a psychological perspective.  Strange, inexplicable things.

Knowledge of psychological principles comes in handy daily, but there are some things that simply can’t be adequately explained, and all the studies in the world couldn’t come close to offering elucidations of bizarre happenings.

By a significant margin, obstetricians drop male babies more frequently than they drop female babies.

This is clearly noted in the statistics, yet possible rationalizations for why this may occur are weak.  Is it because males are seen as stronger physically, and thus they are handled with less grace?  Do male babies struggle more straight out of mommy’s womb?  No one really knows.

Men, any ideas?  Is this statistic offensive to you?

Among the most bizarre of the behavioral oddities we’ve seen in our species are the manifestations of mass hysteria documented through the centuries.

Have you heard of the Dancing Plague of 1518?

This happened in Strasbourg, France.  Hundreds of people were stricken with the uncontrollable, maniacal urge to dance, dance, dance.  They danced and they danced, and they kept dancing for about a month, during which time a good number of these dancers died.  Heart attack, exhaustion, dehydration, stroke.

These people dancing – it was unclear that they even wanted to be dancing to begin with.  Many of them were frightened and displaying clear signs of terror and discomfort, and free will seemed not to apply to these people.  This was not a jubilant dance; this was causing their deaths.  Yet, the dancing could not be stopped.

The theory seems to be that mass psychogenic illness is caused by mass hysteria, which is caused by mass distress.  The original distress would certainly be a reaction to some political, governmental, or social movement – though, unless you count protesting, I didn’t see any hysterical dancing in the streets of Los Angeles when Prop 8 was inexplicably passed.

Back in 1518, though, there were problems with basic life – eating, keeping warm, illness, producing crops.  I can only imagine that the threat of having little to no food during an ice storm would trigger some hysteria.

This dance hysteria has occurred a few times throughout history – it’s referred to as St. John’s Dance.  When these outbreaks first began, the dancers were thought to be possessed by the devil.  Exorcisms were held, but either they couldn’t keep these motherfuckers still enough to successfully exorcise the demons, or there were never any demons in the first place, so the exorcisms were unsuccessful.

Also unhelpful were the musicians who frequently joined in with the dancers.  At the time (and arguably still to this day), music was seen as a possible cure for physical maladies, so these musicians were attempting to help.  But shit.  I bet it was hard to be a bystander, witnessing this dance hysteria, and then the musicians joining it, and not thinking that the musicians were maybe poking fun.  Just a little.  And the stimulation the music provided to the mass dance hysteria likely only aggravated the situation.

A more scientific approach would blame ergotism – a type of poisoning caused by the consumption of rye infected with a fungus that contains psychoactive chemicals – the same psychoactive chemicals that appear in LSD.  Ergot poisoning would result in symptoms including psychotic delusions, convulsions, and nervous spasms.  It can also be fatal.  This seems the most likely explanation.  Only, ergotism causes convulsions and nervous spasms, not dancing.  And this was dancing.  This was clearly dancing.  So what gives?

Recently, in 1962, another epidemic broke out similar to St. John’s Dance, only this wasn’t dancing.  It was laughing.  Maniacal, hysterical laughing.   It was called the Tanganyika Laughter Epidemic, and it occurred in Tanzania.  Apparently, there were thousands of people laughing – laughing unremittingly – for months.  It appeared to be contagious; get too close and you’ll be laughing, too.  Schools were shut down, and paranoia that this mass laughing attack would spread to neighboring towns was high.  These people weren’t having fun.  They were in pain.  Too much laughing, too little rest, too little oxygen being taken in with their gasps for air between laughs.  Much like the dancing, this was not euphoric; this was unpleasant.

Really, there’s no explanation for any of these outbreaks.  For any of this manifestation of mass hysteria.

I’d like to know your theories.  And I’d like to know when the next one is coming.  Because I really want to be there.

TAGS: dancing plague, Dancing Plague of 1518, laughing plague, Lenore Zion, mass hysteria, St. John’s Dance, Tanganyika Laughter Epidemic

Lenore Zion earned her MFA in fiction writing in 2004 and then ventured forth into the cruel world of working at Blockbuster Video. Shortly after being unharmed in a wimpy DVD robbery, she retreated to the safety of academia and began a doctoral program in clinical psychology. In May of 2010, Lenore will once again be released into the real world, this time armed with a more important sounding graduate degree. Lenore is currently working on her first novel, a quirky and twisted exploration of her internal world that she has cleverly masked as a "story." She can be reached at LenoreZion@gmail.com.

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This entry was posted on Friday, June 26th, 2009 at 2:26 pm and is filed under Essays, Nonfiction. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.