Standing in a shopping mall looking down to the floors below and think to myself. “Jump” In no way do I want to kill myself but when I brought this up a lot of my friends had been through the same thing. Ive started to see memes about it online. So what’s up? [jump! ](https://d279m997dpfwgl.cloudfront.net/wp/2018/06/0629_reddit-void-main-1000×1425.jpg)
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We made a whole episode of our podcast about this and used this same image! Listen here: https://www.wbur.org/endlessthread/2018/06/29/the-call-of-the-void
Here’s an explanation from the episode about why we have this particular kind of intrusive thought:
April Smith, an associate professor of psychology at Miami University in Ohio, has studied this. She even co-authored a study about it, “An urge to jump affirms the urge to live, an empirical examination of the high place phenomenon.”
(“High place phenomenon” is what scientists call The Call of The Void).
Her research found a few things. One, that about 50 percent of people have experienced aspects of the call of the void. And two, that it’s the result of some kind of miscommunication in your brain.
“It could be the case that when you’re up somewhere high, your brain is basically sending an alarm signal — you know, be careful. And that could actually lead you to take a step back, or notice your surroundings,” she says. “Then that more deliberative process kind of kicks in and you start to think, why did I just take a step back? I’m totally fine. There’s no reason for me to be afraid. Oh, I must have wanted to jump.”
Like a trick of the mind — a post hoc rationalization of a behavior. And it’s not anything to worry about, she says. Some thoughts are just chatter, or static. They don’t mean you’re going to do something, or not do something.
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