Мәдениетке байланысты аурулар және психикалық-дене симптомдары

Psychiatric and somatic symptoms experienced within a specific culture

In medicine and medical anthropology, a culture bound syndrome, culture specific syndrome, or folk illness is a combination of psychiatric and somatic symptoms that are considered to be a recognizable disease only within a specific society or culture. There are no objective biochemical or structural alterations of body organs or functions, and the disease is not recognized in other cultures. The term culture bound syndrome was included in the fourth version of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (American Psychiatric Association, 1994) which also includes a list of the most common culture bound conditions (DSM IV: Appendix I). Counterpart within the framework of ICD 10 (Chapter V) are the culture specific disorders defined in Annex 2 of the Diagnostic criteria for research. More broadly, an endemic that can be attributed to certain behavior patterns within a specific culture by suggestion may be referred to as a potential behavioral epidemic. As in the cases of drug use, or alcohol and smoking abuses, transmission can be determined by communal reinforcement and person to person interactions. On etiological grounds, it can be difficult to distinguish the causal contribution of culture upon disease from other environmental factors such as toxicity.

Within the traditional Hmong culture, epilepsy (qaug dab peg) directly translates to "the spirit catches you and you fall down" which is said to be an evil spirit called a dab that captures one's soul and makes one ill. In this culture, individuals with seizures are seen to be blessed with a gift: an access point into the spiritual realm which no one else has been given. In westernised society, epilepsy is recognized as a serious long term brain condition that can have a major impairment on an individual's life. The way the illness is dealt with in Hmong culture is vastly different due to the high status epilepsy has in the culture, compared to individuals who have the condition in westernised societies. Individuals with epilepsy within the Hmong culture are a source of pride for their family. Another culture bound illness is neurasthenia, which is a vaguely described medical ailment in Chinese culture that presents as lassitude, weariness, headaches, and irritability and is mostly linked to emotional disturbance. A report done in 1942 showed that 87% of patients diagnosed by Chinese psychiatrists as having neurasthenia could be reclassified as having major depression according to the DSM 3 criteria. Another study conducted in Hong Kong showed that most patients selectively presented their symptoms according to what they perceived as appropriate and tended to only focus on somatic suffering, rather than the emotional problems they were facing.

Globalisation is a process whereby information, cultures, jobs, goods, and services are spread across national borders. This has had a powerful impact on the 21st century in many ways including through enriching cultural awareness across the globe. Greater level of cultural integration is occurring due to rapid industrialisation and globalisation, with cultures absorbing more influences from each other. As cultural awareness begins to increase between countries, there is a consideration into whether cultural bound syndromes will slowly lose their geographically bound nature and become commonly known syndromes that will then become internationally recognised. Anthropologist and psychiatrist Roland Littlewood makes the observation that these diseases are likely to vanish in an increasingly homogenous global culture in the face of globalisation (and industrialisation). Depression, for example, was once only accepted in western societies; it is now recognised as a mental disorder in all parts of the world. In contrast to Eastern civilizations such as Taiwan, depression is still much more common in Western cultures like the United States. This could indicate that globalisation may have an impact on allowing disorders to be spread across borders, but these disorders may remain predominant in certain cultures.