Is There a Name for This Phenomenon?

Factual Questions
1

According to legend, when med students start learning about a new disease, it’s common for some of them to start thinking that maybe they have that disease.

First, does this really happen? And second, is there a name for this phenomenon? i.e., you learn about some disease and start wondering if you have that disease?

2

Hypochondria.

3

I have heard it called Med Students disease.

4

I wouldn’t know if a med school specific label exists but here are some generalized candidates:

Anchoring
Availability cascade
Clustering illusion
Forer effect

pulled from… List of cognitive biases - Wikipedia

5

I don’t know the name but it is real. Professors tend to give official warnings about it in at the beginning of abnormal psychology classes because it affects so many students who don’t have the proper clinical context to relate to lists of symptoms. “Self-diagnose” is a related term.

6

Like Shagnasty says, my abnormal psychology students get a standard warning from me at the beginning of the semester to not diagnose themselves or anyone else with whatever we’re studying that week. I refer to it as “med school student syndrome” or “grad student syndrome.” I don’t know if it’s got an official name, but in terms of cognitive psychology, it would seem to be a combination of the anchoring and adjustment heuristic combined with the confirmation bias and good old-fashioned paranoia.

7

Would that be the same thing that we laypeople call “the power of suggestion” (not in relation to hypnosis)? You know, tell somebody not to think of purple dolphins and then that’s all they can think of the rest of the day.

8

Isn’t this similar to what’s called “bias confirmation” in general? It doesn’t have to be a medical issue.
Suppose you have a theory that, say, blondes are dumber than average: then every time you see a blonde girl do something dumb, you say to yourself “see, I knew I was right”.You ignore all the observations that don’t fit your theory and overemphasize the few facts that do.

So a med student learns a new theory that , say, hair grows on your palms if you masturbate.
Suddenly he sees a new hair that he had ignored…

9

Thanks . . . I did a google search on med student syndrome and found this wiki page:

10

I think it’s interesting phenomenon, 'cause the sight of blood doesn’t really bother me, but if I read a book and the author describes it, it can make me sick that way