Baskerville effect

The Baskerville effect, or the Hound of the Baskervilles effect is a statisticalobservation that mortality through heart attacksis increased by psychological stress. It is named after the fictional Charles Baskerville from the Sherlock HolmesnovelThe Hound of the Baskervilles who died as a result of the stress of encountering the fierce dogafter which the story is named.

It was discovered by David Phillips and his colleagues at the University of California, San Diego, who found that daily number of deaths of the 200,000 Chineseand JapaneseAmericanswho died from heart attacks between 1973and 1988was 7 % higher on the fourth of the month compared to the average for the other days in that week.

Four(四, formal writing: 肆, pinyinsi4) is considered an unlucky numberin Chineseand Japanese(as well as Korean) cultures because it sounds like "death" (死 pinyinsi3). Some Chinese and Japanese hotelsand hospitalsdo not use it as a room number[1].

His hypothesis was that the peak was caused by stress induced by the superstitionsurrounding this number. Previous research had also shown a complementary effect, mortality falling before auspicious occasions and rising again afterwards.

References

• New Scientist magazine, 2001
• British Medical Journal - The Hound of the Baskervilles effect: natural experiment on the influence of psychological stress on timing of death

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It uses material from the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baskerville+effect Wikipedia article Baskerville effect.