DEFINITION

• The defining features of a culture-bound syndrome (CBS) are its prevalence within a specific ethno-cultural group and that it is a distressing deviance from the usual behavior, cognitions, or affect of that group.
• Though broadly described as “syndromes”, this is not an accurate description of all culture-bound entities. Some are indeed a syndromal clustering of symptoms, however others are more accurately defined as local explanatory models of illness or an illness label for diverse misfortunes.
• Synonyms for CBS: folk illness, idiom for distress, culture-specific disorder, cultural concept of distress