TikTok Tics and Sociogenic Illnesses
The Story of Sociogenic illnesses and how they have evolved.
In 1518, a woman in Alsace, France walked onto a street and started dancing uncontrollably. She did not stop. She could not. Within two months, the dancing plague had spread to 50-400 people.
All of them danced without stopping on the streets of France. Those who were unaffected looked on in bizarre exasperation at what had affected their compatriots.
Demonic possessions were blamed. Others suggested the bite of a Tarantula that forced convulsion in the people. Modern historians look back on the events from the ‘Dancing Plague of 1518’ and have two explanations.
The people were either infected by a fungal stomach infection which caused a frenzy among them. Others believe it was a case of a mass sociogenic illness.
Closer to Home
In 2011, A high-school cheerleader in New York woke up with her face spasming uncontrollably and her chin jerking forward. A few days later, her best friend, also a cheerleader, also started experiencing spasms and uncontrollable movements in her body.
Soon, 12 people in a school of 600 had reported the same spasms, jerks, twitches, and stutters. Naturally, the media soon picked up on the juicy story of young girls in a remote town being struck by a “mysterious illness”. Neurologists and mental health experts were called in to understand what exactly was going wrong with these girls.
The experts believed this was a case of a conversion disorder that developed into a mass sociogenic illness with time. They believed that the young girls were under such immense stress and pressure that their brain was converting those mental stressors into physical symptoms.
Naturally, the guardians of these girls were unimpressed. “What are these the 1600s?” one of them said, refusing to believe that mass hysteria could still be happening in the modern world.
The parents believed that an accident more than 5 decades ago had left toxic chemicals in the soil. A team was called in. No such toxin was found.
Instead, the “chemical toxin theory” made the symptoms worse for young girls. “The chemical is in my head. It has ruined my life now.” one of them said while crying under treatment.
After extensive treatment, both with antibiotics and neurologists, the girls started showing rapid improvement. In a few months’ time, it was as if they had never been ill. Some were convinced it was the antibiotics that worked, others believed the easing stress improved symptoms.
COVID-19 and Sociogenic Illness
The COVID-19 pandemic was a time of great anxiety for people across the world. We had all been cut off from our social surroundings. We were hearing stories of people dying alone in a hospital away from their loved ones.
The pandemic created the perfect circumstances for more sociogenic illnesses to develop in vulnerable communities. Only this time, the sociogenic “contagion” had gone digital.
Between January 2018 and August 2020, the user base on TikTok grew to 700 million people globally and 100 million people in the US alone. TikTok was popular because of how simple it was. It offered fun bite-sized entertainment and an infinite scroll of its videos.
You could literally never run out of TikToks to watch - also, you could get really popular really quick if you used the platform well. Global lockdowns meant that people had to resort to social media for social connection and TikTok was a popular choice.
Explosive Tics in Teen Girls
While the COVID-19 pandemic was raging across the world, doctors also started noticing an uptick in the number of teen girls showing up with explosive ‘tics’.
A tic is a sudden and uncontrollable movement or sound that repeats itself often. During the pandemic, TikTok became a haven for people sharing their stories with tics and how they had affected their lives.
These videos, unwittingly, became a contagion for young, impressionable teenagers who were experiencing intense anxiety and lacked meaningful social connections.
Slowly, these tics they had seen on TikTok started becoming a part of their lives too. A particular case involved a teenager randomly shouting “beetroot”, “pay me!” and “I am a silly goose!” similar to a video on TikTok from an influential figure.
Interestingly, young girls seemed to be affected by these tics, and sociogenic illnesses at large, more commonly than young boys. The reasons for that are unclear.
Now What?
As strange as the case of TikTok tics is, what is even stranger is how quickly the cases of TikTok tics have receded since the world opened up. As pre-pandemic activities returned, so did the social connection that had been lagging for so long. The anxiety eased and the stress of potential impending doom was put off for a while.
A pattern of behavior that had confounded pediatricians and physicians for so long seemed to disappear within months. It did leave us with some concerning questions though.
Until now, sociogenic illnesses had been limited by geography but the case of TikTok Tics suggests that it is no longer the case. As society moves towards social media being the primary form of social interaction, it is possible that a contagion that started in the narrow streets of France finds its way to the river town of Banaras simply through the internet.
Are we truly prepared for the next mass social-media-induced illness? It also stresses the importance of medical professionals who are up to date with the latest technological and cultural trends.
It is our knowledge of cultural and social trends that will prevent the misdiagnosis of a sociogenic illness as mere “spasms” or worse, malingering.
How will you, as a professional, keep yourself up to date with social media and its trends?