Mass Hysteria Characteristics

Understanding Mass Hysteria and its Fundamental Characteristics The power of mass hysteria is so dangerous that it can create both physical and psychological situations that can take lives, change global politics and cause panic in hundreds or even thousands of individuals. Mass hysteria is when emotions, especially fear in a group of people are so strong that it leads people to act in an uncontrolled way. Some examples of mass hysteria are the Salem witch trials, the fear experienced by Americans during the Cold War and the hundreds of false accusations against the McMartin preschool staff in California. There are many parallels in each of the cases of mass hysteria in this paper; all 3 cases are spread by rumors, they all have an authority figure that plays a major role in continuing the hysteria and all three cases have moral and cultural beliefs that have made people distrustful (Bartholomew). Recently, society has experienced panic and mass hysteria with the outbreak of Ebola; it is clear that today’s society is …show more content…
It all began with two young girls, Elizabeth Parris and her cousin Abigail Williams who were acting strangely, they would have fits of screaming, make weird sounds and writhe in pain. These symptoms could be explained as “motor hysteria”.
“Motor hysteria is prevalent in intolerable social situations such as strict school and religious settings where discipline is excessive. Symptoms include trance-like states, melodramatic acts of rebellion known as histrionics, and what physicians term “psychomotor agitation” (whereby pent-up anxiety built up over a long period results in disruptions to the nerves or neurons that send messages to the muscles, triggering temporary bouts of twitching, spasms, and shaking)” (“Mass Delusions and