Culture-Bound Psychopathology
Specific Culture-Bound Psychopathologies
Specific Disorders: Amok
Description: Dissociative episode preceeded by introspective brooding, followed by an outburst of violent, aggressive or homicidal behavior. After the attack, the person experiences persecutory ideas, amnesia and exhaustion.
Location: Malaysia and Southeast Asia, also the Phillippines, Polynesia, New Guinea; possibly Puerto Rico and Native Americans (Navajo).
Specific Disorders:
Arctic Hysteria
Description: Convulsive hysterical attacks, sometimes conversion symptoms, following the actual or symbolic loss of someone or something important.
Location: Eskimo
Specific Disorders:
Ashanti Psychosis
Description: Two types: (1) "frenzied guilt-and-fear" (FGF) and (2) depressive (DP), mostly affecting women..
- Location: West Africa, e.g. Ghana
Specific Disorders:
Ashanti Psychosis (cont.)
FGF psychoses
begin with belief the person is being punished for some offense
person becomes frightened and then frenzied. This is followed by a period of withdrawal, hallucinations, hebephrenic behavior, dancing, singing, tearing off clothes and eating feces.
FGF psychoses were sometimes proceeded by a physical illness with fever
Specific Disorders:
Ashanti Psychosis (cont.)
DP patients
accused themselves of being witches and harming someone else without conscious intent.
In younger women this often followed a difficult childbirth and subsequent illness or the death of an infant
Specific Disorders:
Ataque de Nervios
Description: Uncontrollable shouting, attacks of crying, trembling, verbal or physical aggression, dissociative or seizure--like episodes, fainting spells. Onset related to stressful family event, such as death or conflict.
Location: Caribbean Latinos, also Latin America and Latin Mediterranean groups
Specific Disorders: Brain Fag
Description: Person feels their brains are fatigued. Associated with poor concentration and memory, difficulty thinking. Most often found in high school or university students under stress.
Location: West Africa
Specific Disorders: Falling Out
Description: Collapse, preceded by feelings of dizziness. Person is paralyzed and unable to move, although they can hear and understand. Possibly related to stress or trauma.
Location: Ethnic groups in Southeastern U.S., especially Miami. Primarily African Americans and Afro-Caribbeans
Specific Disorders:
Ghost Sickness
Description: Preoccupation with death or someone who has died, sometimes associated with witchcraft. Symptoms include nightmares, weakness, anxiety and feelings of danger, poor appetite, dizziness and fainting, sometimes a sense of suffocation.
Location: Native American groups
Specific Disorders:
Gururumba ("wild man") episode
Description:
Begins with the person (usually male after marriage) burglarizing homes for minor items, which they believe are valuable; poor insight
hyperactive and clumsy in movement, and may have speech or hearing disturbances
then runs off into the forest for some days, returns (without the objects) to his normal life.
he is typically amnestic for the episode
Location: New Guinea
Specific Disorders:
Hmong Sudden Death Syndrome
Description: Person dies during their sleep as a result of attacks by spirits in a dream. Often occurs in people who have been subjected to trauma.
Location: Laos
Related culture-bound disorders: bangungut (Oriental nightmare death); voodoo death
Specific Disorders:
Hwa-byung
Description: Epigastric pain, attributed to a mass in the upper abdomen that the patient fears will lead to death. Also tiredness, insomnia, panic, fear of impending death, loss of appetite, GI problems, palpitations, muscle ache and pain. Believed to result from imbalances caused by anger.
Location: Korea
Specific Disorders: Koro
Description: Fear that the penis (or occasionally vulva and nipples) will retract into the body and cause death.
Location: Malaysia, other parts of South and East Asia. Can occur in epidemics.
Specific Disorders: Latah
Description: Hypersensitivity to fright or startle, hypersuggestibility, echopraxia or echolalia, dissociative or trancelike behavior
Location: Malaysia and Indonesia
Specific Disorders:
"Lost Hunter" Sequence
Description:
begins with depression/withdrawal from social life following a veiled criticism of actions.
the person (typically male) will go hunting alone in the bush and describe five episodes of tracking a large game animal which suddenly disappears. He feels he has been lead astray by supernatural beings in animal form.
he is eventually rescued by a search party, typically of close relatives and clansmen.
Location: New Guinea
Specific Disorders:
Mal de Ojo ("evil eye")
Description: Fitful sleep, crying without apparent cause, diarrhea, vomiting and fever
- Location: Mediterranean cultures, particularly children
Specific Disorders: Nervios
Description: Wide range of somatic, emotional and behavioral symptoms, including headache or brain ache, sleep problems, anxiety, tearfulness and emotional lability, dizziness and tingling.
Location: Common complaint among Latinos in the U.S. and Latin America
Specific Disorders: Rootwork
Description: A variety of complaints attributed to hexing, witchcraft, sorcery or the evil influence of another person. Symptoms include anxiety, GI complaints, fear of being poisoned or killed. Can result in death.
Location: Haiti; Sub-Saharan Africa
Related culture-bound disorders: Voodoo death, mal puesto, hex
Specific Disorders: Shen kui
Description: Anxiety and panic with somatic complaints, especially sexual dysfunctions such as premature ejaculation and impotence. Symptoms are attributed to excessive semen loss from sexual activity or "white turbid urine," which reduces one's vital energy. It is viewed as a life-threatening condition.
Location: China and areas with Chinese ethnic population
Specific Disorders: Susto
Description: Fear that the soul will leave the body or that an event has caused this, leading to sickness and eventual death.
Location: Latinos in U.S., Mexico, Central and South America
Specific Disorders:
Taijin kyofusho
Description: Fear and guilt about embarrassing others with one's behavior. Especially prominent in younger people.
Location: Japan
Specific Disorders: Wacinko
Description: Anger, withdrawal, mutism and immobility frequently leading to suicide. Often a reaction to disappointment or interpersonal problems
- Location: North America, in Native American groups (Oglala Sioux)
Specific Disorders:
Wind Illness (p’a leng)
Description: Fear of being cold or of the wind, which is associated with a loss of yang and upset of natural balance in the body. The person does everything they can to stay warm.
- Location: Areas with Chinese ethnic populations (China, Southeast Asia)
Specific Disorders:
Windigo Psychosis
Description: Begins with a morbid state of anxiety about physical symptoms including poor appetite, nausea and vomiting. Anxiety centers around the belief that the person is being overcome by a supernatural monster and becoming a Windigo (cannibal). There is potential for suicide or for the person to be the target of violence.
Location: Native Americans of central and northeastern Canada
Specific Disorders: Zar
Description: Dissociative symptoms, shouting, laughing, head banging, weeping and other demonstrative behaviors. Person believes they are possessed by a spirit., and may develop a long-term relationship with the spirit. Behavior is not considered pathological.
Location: East and North Africa, Middle East, especially Ethiopia, Somalia, Sudan, Egypt, Iran