5 Halloween Character Case Files

I got this article from WebMD, by way of Alicia's blog Mental Health Notes (thanks, Alicia!).

They did case files for witches, zombies, ghouls, vampires, and werewolves. It's pretty fascinating. Some of the things we learn are that witches are probably the most psychologically healthy of the characters, since they were likely to have been women healers and herbalists, especially in the Middle Ages. Not that there haven't been women who weren't mentally ill or used their skills for harm, but mostly, they were just misunderstood and feared because of their knowledge and power.

Zombies were probably originally victims of medieval "trials by ordeal" in which accused persons were treated with a drug that made some people stumble about and walk stiffly with arms outstretched (of course, if you didn't do that, you were innocent). It's also possible that another origin was in Haiti, among voodoo priests who would drug a victim into subservience, say that it was done by magic, and make those victims their zombie slaves.

Ghouls, which are creatures that eat corpses, were probably originally people with one of those disordered compulsions that compelled them to fantasize and obsess about eating dead flesh, and then sometimes to do it. That's about all they say, but I'd be very interested in knowing more about that kind of obsession (or maybe I'm just better off not knowing!).

Apparently there are several psychiatrists who have done analyses of vampires, particularly Bram Stoker's Dracula. They talk about a pathological need to control others, which may be represented by their controlling their very life and death through their blood. They also mention anemia as a possible physiological cause, but surprisingly they don't mention porphyria, which is the one I've always heard.

Werewolves and other were-animals are probably afflicted with a rare psychiatric disorder called lycanthropy. In this disorder, the person imagines himself or herself able to turn into an animal, possibly as a way to cope with violent or murderous feelings.

So, there you go. All the spooky stories, all the supernatural things that have ever happened can be explained by the psychiatrists.

Or can they?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clinical_lycanthropy