In 1936, Karen Horney, a Neo-Freudian psychoanalyst who once had an ill-fated affair with pioneering social psychologist Erich Fromm, published what was then the definitive work on neurosis, The Neurotic Personality of Our Time. Naturally, she was a New York City resident at the time. (Brooklyn, actually.)

As long as the terms “neurotic,” or “high strung,” or “nervous breakdown” have been around, they have been inextricably linked with this city. As Evelyn Waugh put it, “There is [a] neurosis in the air which inhabitants mistake for energy.”

For a while, when Woody Allen was really nailing it and Seinfeld topped the ratings, it was all to the good—part of our charm.

Then, in 2008, a Cambridge University study showed that New York was home to “the most neurotic and unfriendly people” in the United States. The study went on to say that people living in eastern states along the “Stress Belt”—especially New Yorkers—are likely to be anxious, stressed, impulsive and prone to heart disease and cancer. Ah, something else to be neurotic about.


[www.observer.com]



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/06/2011 04:38PM by askanewyorker.