Ethnomedicine and ethnobotany of fright, a Caribbean culture-bound psychiatric syndrome

Abstract

Background"Fright" is an English-speaking Caribbean idiom for an illness, or ethnomedical syndrome, of persistent distress. A parallel ethnopsychiatric idiom exists in the French Antilles as sésisma. Fright is distinct from susto among Hispanics, though both develop in the wake of traumatic events. West Indian ethnophysiology (ethnoanatomy) theorizes that an overload of stressful emotions (fear, panic, anguish or worry) causes a cold humoral state in which blood coagulates causing prolonged distress and increased risks of other humorally cold illnesses.MethodsQualitative data on local explanatory models and treatment of fright were collected using participant-observation, informal key informant interviews and a village health survey. Ethnobotanical and epidemiological data come from freelist (or "free-list") tasks, analyzed for salience, with nearly all adults (N = 112) of an eastern village in Dominica, and a village survey on medicinal plant recognition and use (N = 106).ResultsAlong with prayer and exercise, three herbs are salient fright treatments: Gossypium barbadense L., Lippia micromera Schauer, and, Plectranthus [Coleus] amboinicus [Loureiro] Sprengel. The survey indicated that 27% of village adults had medicated themselves for fright. Logistic regression of fright suffering onto demographic variables of age, education, gender, parental status and wealth measured in consumer goods found age to be the only significant predictor of having had fright. The probability of having (and medicating for) fright thus increases with every year.ConclusionsWhile sufferers are often uncomfortable recalling personal fright experiences, reporting use of medicinal plants is less problematic. Inquiry on fright medical ethnobotany (or phytotherapies) serves as a proxy measurement for fright occurrence. Cross-cultural and ethnopharmacology literature on the medicinal plants suggests probable efficacy in accord with Dominican ethnomedical notions of fright. Further, the cultural salience and beliefs about these medicines may give these medications extra psychoneuroimmune (i.e. mind-body) benefits, or placebo-like effects, for this stress-related folk illness.

Classifying diseases and remedies in ethnomedicine and ethnopharmacology

“…A strict dichotomy does not exist and healing ceremonies appeasing nature gods might be involved in both, personalistic and naturalistic etiological systems (Foster and Anderson, 1978). However, there exists a variety of "cultural syndromes" associated with the manifestation of psychological distress across cultures (Nichter, 2010), which biomedicine would diagnose as "nervousness", "stress", "mental illnesses" or "depression" (Quinlan, 2010;Foster and Anderson, 1978). Consequently, lab-based ethnopharmacologists screen plants used against e.g.…”

Culture-bound syndromes in Spanish speaking Latin America: the case of Nervios, Susto and Ataques de Nervios

“…Description of the characteristics of cross-cultural syndromes based on ethnographic data (description of the syndrome from the culture in which it was first described) and epidemiological data Among the 31 selected references, 23 studies focused on Ataques de Nervios and Nervios (Table 1). Eight were qualitative studies [17][18][19][20][21][22][23]24 focused on the characterization of the causes, symptoms, and treatments as described by those affected by the conditions. Among the selected references, seven were about Susto (Table 3), four of them were qualitative studies [25][26][27][28] , three focused on the causes, symptoms and treatment of Susto 24,26,28 and one focused only on the causes of Susto 25 .…”

“…From the 23 articles on Nervios, Susto and Ataques de Nervios, 56% were qualitative studies [17][18][19][20][21][23][24][25][26][27]29,33,40 . These studies were conducted directly with the local population to ascertain the conception of these syndromes or conducted with people affected by them and describing their symptoms.…”

“…Interviews with the affected individuals found that Ataques de Nervios, Nervios e Susto were related to different types of stress through interviews with the affected individuals [17][18][19]21,[23][24][25]27,29 . Nervios was related to exposure to stressful events over a period of years, while Ataques de Nervios and Susto were related to exposure to specific events triggering the symptoms 17,19 .…”

Ant-diarrheal Plants of Central Anatolia: Do They Inhibit Diarrhea-causing Bacteria?

“…Free-listing exercises and saliency ranking techniques (Alexiades 1996, Nolan 2001, Quinlan 2010 were performed with every group interview. While saliency is normally calculated for individual informants, the formula was modified to analyze a small group's comments and listings.…”