Is there any empirical evidence or scientific proof that a full moon causes people to behave strangely, or exacerbates whatever peculiarities or obsessions a person may have?

All I know is that my friend who works in the ER is always complaining of the abundance of stupid injuries that come in on a fullmoon.

It is scientific fact. The term "Lunatic" is derived from the observations compiled over hundreds of years of observing patients "tics" or behaviors during the lunar cycle.

The studies are not consistent. (from national geographic) Case in point: Two separate studies published in the December 23, 2000 issue of the British Medical Journal contradict each other on the question of whether animals bite people more during a full moon.

Chanchall Bhattacharjee and colleagues at the Bradford Royal Infirmary in Bradford, England, reviewed 1,621 patients admitted to the infirmary's emergency room between 1997 and 1999 for animal bites and found that the chances of being bitten were twice as high on or around full-moon days.

But Simon Chapman at the University of Sydney in Australia compared dates of admission for dog bites to public hospitals in Australia with dates of the full moon over a 12-month period and found no positive relation between the full moon and dog bites.

In fact, Chapman found that full-moon days were associated with slightly lower admissions—4.6 compared with 4.8 per day. Of the 18 days with more than 10 admissions, the maximum peak centered on the New Year holiday. Full moons coincided with none of the peaks.

Chapman, who said the study was a "one-off curiosity driven exercise," has no idea why the full moon appears to cause animals in England to bite more humans but has no bearing on when dogs in Australia bite.

Similar contradictions can be found when comparing many other studies as well, such as whether or not violence, police arrests, or self poisoning increase during a full moon, according to Eric Chudler, a psychologist at the University of Washington in Seattle. "Of the studies I have read, I find that there is very little evidence that the full moon has a direct effect on human or animal behavior," he said.


According to a report in the British newspaper The Daily Telegraph Mexican tequila distiller Jose Cuervo sponsored a psychiatrist at Kings College in London to study the association between the full moon and strange behavior as portrayed in literature.

The psychiatrist, Glenn Wilson, found that the full moon has been portrayed in folklore and legends for centuries as cause for celebration, particularly in the times before modern lighting.

"There is good reason to believe that people's personalities do change around the time of the full moon, not because of any astronomical force, but because it creates the optimum lighting conditions for feeling carefree and mischievous," Wilson told the paper.

No, there's no evidence at all. It's simply a myth.

No, not that I know of. However, from working in a facility for troubled kids (read kids with mental illness) I can tell you that incidents spiked during full moon, mostly because the kids knew they had more hours of light. Most of our group runaways and "riots" happened during full moon, because the kids felt the moon gave them the advantage of being able to see where they were going while being harder to see to the police and staff.

Apparently the ancient Romans believed that the lunar cycle affects the tides and a female's menstrual cycle. They believed that the full moon causes bizarre behavior. The term "looney" comes from the Latin word "luna" for moon. I don't know of any scienfic evidence to support the conclusion that the full moon induces bizarre behavior.

It is open for discussion! Please see
http://www.innerself.com/Astrology/full_moon.htm
http://skepdic.com/fullmoon.html
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2002/12/1218_021218_moon.html

Go to an ER during a full moon. Look at their pateint records and see the how many more they have during that time. The moon's gravitational pull causes the tides, which ar water, and one could only make sense that since we are over 70% water the moons pull would have an effect of maybe pulling on the cerebrospinal fluid causing a minute shift or a different amount of pressure placed somewhere else in the brain to cause altered behavior. If you watch animals, they become more aggressive (not more active). Many deer hunters will say that a full moon is a waste of time to go hunting because very few deer come out (maybe they know something) q:)

Well it's not called "A Hunters Moon" for nothing and with roughly 5 million years of being the prey I'm sure that some of that "FEAR" remains somewhere in our unconsciousness, what was more than likely a survival instinct or response has now become an adverse psychological response to the modern world that never really sleeps and YES there is some evidence that suggest adverse things happen around the time of the full moon I would figure that at least half is a learned response and the other a warped psychology of instincts based on what I said above ...

~Nemo~

"The lunar effect is a theory which overlaps into sociology, psychology and physiology suggesting that there is correlation between specific stages of the Earth's lunar cycle and deviant behavior in human beings. It is a pseudoscientific theory, however. The claims of a correlation of lunar phases to human behavior do not hold up under scientific scrutiny. Over the past 30 years, even more evidence has emerged to stress that this is pseudoscience.

The theory is sometimes also referred to as the Transylvanian hypothesis or the Transylvanian effect in scholarly literature."

"The notion behind the lunar effect has fascinated many behavioralists and warranted many experiments and studies. Most experiments, however, have found no correlation between the variables and, thus, refuted the theory.

There are some studies which have results the researchers claimed supported the theory. For example, a study concluded that schizophrenic patients show signs of deterioration, in terms of quality of life and mental well-being, during the time of a full moon. Some researchers have claimed that there were strong positive correlations between physiological changes such as induced seizures in epileptic and non-epileptic people and the full moon period in studies they conducted. One study concluded that a statistically significant correlations for gastrointestinal bleeding among males in particular during this time. However, most of these findings are based on small-scale research.
On the other hand, the majority of scientific research seems to refute the theory of the lunar effect."
Source and further information:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lunar_effect

hmmmm, what i know is that EVERY SINGLE month when it's full moon, my dad has MAJOR problems with sleeping at night. Sometimes it happens and when he doesn't know why he looks out of the window at night only to find the big mysterious full moon is out.. isn't that really strange? i think in a way the moon DOES have some kind of power to change human behavior. Only not everyone is actually sensitive enough to notice(like my father is). People will never really find answers to the mysteries of the moon and other strange happenings.. but if there are any other similar subjects PLEASE keep me informed =DDD. I LOVE em ;D. Thats my element

Nope. Any accounts of the behavior do not account for potential lurking variables or influences.

I don't think there's anything particularly exotic about this. Several respondents have already touched on what I think the "problem" is, if there is one.

With a full moon, there is more light at night. Consequently, more people will be out of doors and doing things then. They will even be more active indoors because of the added light.

I'd like to see an experiment or observations on this that controlled for "light" and see what the results are.

At least one other respondent also mentioned something that adds even more historical relevance on this. Many cultures have told time in relation to "moons" (full moon displays). So "a moon" is sometimes a time of celebration ... and the various oddities, accidents (and drunken revelries) that those entail.

I still like the movie "Moonstruck", though.

Don't know but worked a 7-11 in colorado and I'd normally get a few "Odd ones" in time to time, but during the full moons, they 'd really come out of the woodwork.

Had one guy walk aroud the store 3 times before coming in as he was afraid the CIA was chasing him or watching him.

2 bags of chips, 2 beers and a bottle of mouthwash..Every 30 days..Weird.

I worked the midnight shift as a cashier in a Super Kmart...there was ALWAYS a lot of strange happening. But, during a full moon, things got a whole LOT stranger!

well i think this myth is true. i don't think anyone turns into LUNAtics (luna being moon i think) but yes, they do behave strangely. i do and my dad does.

There have been studies done that confirm this, something to due with the gravitational pull. But being a nurse in a nursing home and a mental facility I can tell you it is very true!

i feel like i can run a marathon wen its a full moon and i feel very strange and animals act very srange like i ran around in the dark for a bit..... very strange

Well I do believe there is some sort of impact on the population during a full moon. My personal experiences:
I supervised a (trucking)rate clerk who consistently had 98+% accuracy rating, EXCEPT for the couple of days of the full moon cycle. Her accuracy would plummet to as low as 80% Also during this period, we would get really strange/stupid rate requests, viz: COD shipment for Sally in Calgary (no address, no phone, no last name), or How much to ship a fridge to the NWT (no particular destination). I remember this one clearly because I asked if he wanted us to fly over the NWT in a plane and just toss it out wherever we wanted. hahaha.
Also biller accuracy would really drop and we would have more vehicular accidents.
I also found while driving a big rig that there always seemed to be a lot more animal activity on full moon nights.