The Full Moon: Is It Messing With Us?

Hi. I'm Wendy Zuckerman, and you're listening to Science Versus This is the show that pits facts against the full moon. Does it change who we are? This episode about the full moon has been one of our most requested episodes this past year. You asked for it, so here it is. And to start our journey, we sent senior producer Meryl Horne out to brave the streets of New York City. Picture it. There's a chill in the air. Out in the East, the full moon was on the rise. And she ventured into a park to hear firsthand what people experience when there's a full moon. Makes people wild. It makes them carnal. It's a carnal thing happening. Everyone does not act right. It's terrible. I think people are just wilding out. Close out, you know. I'm blaming the moon. That damn moon. Some people said that the full moon stirred up all this drama in their lives. One guy said that sometimes he doesn't even go out when there's a full moon. I'm gonna stay in that night. I'm gonna play it safe. Just like because I know I could feel weird or do crazy stuff. Folks said you just knew it was gonna be a full moon that night because people at work would be going bonkers. And this is in the research too. It shows that some health care workers think the full moon makes their patients behave stranger. One survey even showed that some doctors and nurses think they should get full moon hazard pay. Meryl heard about this as well at the park. My mom was a nurse at the state hospital, and she had a lot of, like, psychiatric patients. And she was like, oh, man. The full moon is the worst. It's the absolute worst. So maybe it is. Because people do act crazy. I worked in retail. I worked there for, like, a full year every single time on the full moon. We had the craziest customers. And I would tell everyone, I'd be like, it's the full moon. Watch out. And they'd be like, it's not gonna be that bad of a day. It was. It was the worst days every single day. You still work there? Or No. I quit. I quit on the full moon, actually. Like, fully quit on the full moon. And perhaps the creepiest thing of all, people said that the full moon could make blood come out of your vagina. I mean, they didn't put it quite like that. It definitely affects me from, like, the feminine cycle, the monthly cycle. Yeah. Do you think you sync up with the full moon? Yeah. For sure. My period will probably be coming because it's usually cycled with the moon. Literally, I go to beauty school. I go to cosmetology school. It's mostly women. All their cycles synced up to this week, basically. So up to the full moon. So, like, they're in the middle …