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Is there a scientific explanation for dramatic body shaking and trembling in religious settings? (see videos for illustrative examples)
Basically the title. I would like to know if there are scientific studies on the phenomenon of experiencing sudden body shaking and trembling in religious settings, usually in response to the command of a person who represents a religious authority. Please take a look at the following examples for illustrative purposes:
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Many people claim they are the result of a supernatural influence acting upon these individuals. Here are some quotes from first-hand experiencers of the phenomenon:

Testimony 1: this is by far the best testimony I know of. The context is the Brownsville Revival. In the video a lady testifies about her experience of body shaking and trembling allegedly as a manifestation of the Holy Spirit acting upon her. In fact she begins to shake and tremble on camera as she is narrating her testimony. At 6:46 the lady and the preacher begin to talk specifically about the causes of her tremors. At 7:12 she says "[...]like right now, I think the Glory of God is so strong up here, my body can't really take it and that's why I'm doing this [...]"
Testimony 2: The testimony as a whole is powerful, but regarding body shaking and trembling at 4:54 the guy describes his experience. Here a quote: "[...] my body started doing things that defied metaphysics, my body started doing things that I couldn't explain. I started levitating and bouncing off of the chair I was sitting in like a jack hammer [...]"
Testimony 3: "[...]I felt an electricity, a fire[...]" followed by the girl trembling and fainting in reaction to the command of the preacher. Then the preacher says "The power of God is the kingdom of God manifesting in our midst[...]".
Testimony 4: "[...]I felt an electricity all through my body, in all of my joints[...]", followed by the woman trembling and fainting in reaction to the command of the preacher (just like in the previous testimony).
Testimony 5: "[...]I felt a heat, and I felt a peace[...]", followed by the woman trembling and fainting in reaction to the command of the preacher (again).
Testimony 6: "[...]I felt a vibrating that I'm feeling right now[...]", followed by the guy fainting and feeling a sort of ecstasy based on his facial expression, in response to the preacher's command.
Testimony 7: "[...]I was burning all over, and I felt so free, He just embraces you and makes you feel so loved[...]", followed by the guy losing the equilibrium and fainting, in response to the preacher's command.

Many of these videos pertain to Andres Bisonni's ministry, who has run dozens of "miracle crusades" around the world. In this video he claims that his ministry is about "signs, wonders and miracles" and in this video he claims that his ministry started with a supernatural encounter with the Holy Spirit that changed his life. Andres Bissoni has a YouTube Channel with more than 375K subscribers, from which I borrowed most of the example videos above. Most of these videos are highlight video clips from "miracle crusades" and "Holy Spirit revival meetings" and are intended to showcase "the power of God". In particular, most of those highlight clips show instances of dramatic body shaking and trembling, so the claim that they are supernatural is obvious.
Likewise, Example C took place in an evangelistic campaign in Mexico led by the Hispanic pastor and evangelist Juan Carlos Harrigan, who also has a YouTube Channel with over 1 million subscribers. In the video the preacher says in Spanish "[...] está muy fuerte la unción sobre ella, agárrenla, está muy fuerte [...]" which in English translates to "[...] the anointing over her is very strong, hold her, it's very strong [...]", meaning that the dramatic body shaking and trembling the girl experienced is allegedly the result of God's anointing being poured over her.
So we have live recordings of people dramatically shaking and trembling, multiple first-hand testimonies and at least two very influential preachers claiming these manifestations are supernaturally caused.
So, are these manifestations necessarily of supernatural origin? Is the supernatural the only "reasonable" explanation? Are there scientific explanations? Are there scientific studies explaining the mechanics behind this phenomenon, rendering the "supernatural explanation" unnecessary?
Extra points to be given

@PaulJohnson in Skeptics.SE objects that the question for necessity is trivially answerable with no since in principle everyone could be a paid actor, which would explain away everything. Although I agree with him in principle, in all honesty I really doubt this is the case. If these preachers have been hiring actors to fake these manifestations for so many years, by now there would be whistleblowers exposing them (e.g. someone saying "this preacher is a scammer, he hired me to perform in front of the audience"), but so far I haven't come across a single case (I'm talking about Andres Bisonni and Juan Carlos Harrigan specifically, I know there are scammer preachers out there).
Moreover, even children are experiencing this (like here, here, here, here), very old people (like here, here) and even prison inmates, and I really doubt they are all paid actors. So there are clearly sincere people experiencing this stuff, and I don't find it reasonable to gratuitously disregard the phenomenon claiming they are all faking it.

@PaulJohnson in Skeptics.SE also mentioned mass psychogenic illness, which is very interesting, and I thank him for sharing that, but I would really love it if he could elaborate more on that in a formal answer to the question (I wish it was reopened) instead of lightly mentioning it in the comment section. However, looking at the symptoms table in the article, none of the symptoms in the table corresponds to dramatic body shaking or trembling, the closest one is "nervousness" but equating that to "feeling a fire and electricity through your body that makes you shake and tremble, accompanied by feelings of love and peace" is a little bit of a stretch.

@TonyMobbs presents two candidate hypotheses: H4) Conformance to social norms and H8) Attention seeking (since the other hypotheses were dismissed). These hypotheses in essence assert that people are actors intentionally faking it all (in H4 out of peer pressure, in H8 out of love for attention). In other words, H4 and H8 are equivalent to the "Paid Actors" hypothesis, except that without the "Paid" part (since the incentive is other than money). Although in principle this could explain the outer behavior (shaking, trembling, etc.), it fails to explain the multiple reports of very strong sensations and emotions that seem to co-occur with these experiences. In particular, there is a pattern of people reporting strong sensations that they describe with expressions such as "waves of electricity", "fire", "heat", "burning all over", sometimes in combination with "joy", "love", "peace", etc. This is confirmed by a peer-reviewed paper acknowledging that people report these overwhelming feelings and emotions. Also, here is an example testimonial in written form, and here are some example video clips of this: A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, M.
There being so many reports of overwhelming emotions and sensations co-occurring with shaking/trembling, how do H4 and H8 account for them?

Just a note that the cross-post at https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/q/48121/39100 has been closed by their community for lack of any specific claim to review.

I wonder whether the combination of 'peer pressure' the 'need to belong' may play a role.  Another example of this effect in a non religious setting. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KgKY71iiJsQ

The exhibited behaviours are episodic glossolalia, collapsing, fainting, trembling, jerking, convulsing, contorting, and shaking.  The individuals performing these episodic behaviours report experiencing overwhelming emotions of love, peace, ecstasy and euphoria. The exhibited behaviours are inconsistent with the claimed emotions, so perhaps another way to understand the question is to explain why individuals behave in a manner that is inconsistent with their emotions. Examples of behaviour associated with euphoria do not generally include glossolalia, collapsing, fainting, trembling, jerking and shaking. The exhibited behaviours are more congruent with the emotions of stress, anxiety, fear, and confusion.
The exhibited behaviours and reported emotional experiences are observed in both religious and nonreligious settings including:

Indigenous american indian ghost dance ceremonies,
Indian Rain Dance to God Parjanya,
Balinese ceremonies,
Hindu Kundalini Awakening ceremonies, and
Fringe martial arts.

The adoption by some Christian sects of the exhibited behaviours, and other behaviours such as laughing and drunkenness, appears to be relatively recent with the "Toronto Blessing" in the 1990s appearing to be significant.  In all cases exhibited, the behaviours and emotions appear to occur in the presence of, and behest of, a charismatic and captivating authority figure.
In the absence of peer reviewed literature on the topic, eight strawman hypotheses are proposed. In accordance with the principle of parsimony, the hypothesis without discrediting evidence and the least number of assumptions will be tentatively selected.
The strawman hypotheses identified are:
The behaviours and emotions may result from:

an unidentified invisible force (e.g. a spirit or god) causing electro neurological impulses that result in such behaviour,
a hysterical state induced by the leader or other Mass psychogenic illness,
a hysterical state self-induced by the individual,
the individuals are conforming to the directions of an authority figure and/or subject to peer pressure and conforming to the social norms of the group,
the individuals suffering from a Functional Neurological Disorder (FND),
the individuals being paid actors,
the individuals being in a state of hypnosis,
the individuals are attention seeking, or
a Dissociative disorder.

Each of these strawman hypotheses will be examined in turn:

Unidentified invisible force/Divine Intervention.  No confirmatory evidence has yet been tendered supporting the existence of invisible forces, other than the four fundamental forces of gravity, electromagnetism and strong and weak nuclear forces. As the exhibited behaviours are widespread across non-intersecting religious and cultural groups, a further unanswered question is which of the unidentified invisible forces is capable of inducing the emotions and behaviours or whether all unidentified invisible forces are equally capable of inducing such emotions and behaviours. The Christian sects shown in the exhibited videos subscribe to their religion by way of faith, which is ordinarily defined as a belief in the absence of supporting evidence.  There being no scientific evidence of the involvement of unidentified invisible force(s), this hypothesis is dismissed. For further discussions on divine intervention, see  https://doi.org/10.1080/14746700802396106 , https://doi.org/10.5840/faithphil199714215 , https://doi.org/10.31577/orgf.2019.26106 , and https://doi.org/10.7591/9781501735295-074 .

Hysterical state induced by the leader: The presence of a charismatic and captivating leader in all the videos provided suggests credence for this option.  The causes of Mass Psychological Illness remain speculative. The psychological mechanism capable of inducing a hysterical state are not yet understood and the mechanisms used by the charismatic leader are not uniform between the ghost dance ceremonies, Hindu Kundalini Awakening ceremonies, particular martial arts and Christian sects.  There being no identified scientifically established mechanism capable of inducing hysterical states, this hypothesis is dismissed.

Hysterical state induced by the individual: No established mechanism by which an individual may self-induce a hysterical state was identified, therefore, this hypothesis is dismissed.

Conformance to the social norms: There is strong evidence that individuals seek to conform with the directions of authority figures and social norms.  Conformance is due to the desire to avoid behaviours that would exclude them from the group(Burger, 2019; Milgram & Gudehus, 1978; Philippe & Durand, 2011; Schmidt et al., 2019). YouTube records examples of individuals participating in such behaviours but later ceasing the behaviours.  These individuals report conforming to the behaviours due to social and situational pressure. It seems inconceivable that individuals who can participate in activities (in some cases for many years) that reliably induce feelings of love, peace, ecstasy and euphoria would ever seek to depart from such behaviours, yet the internet abounds with stories of individuals ceasing to perform such behaviours. The prevalence of individuals reporting conformance to social and situational pressure and the abundance of established peer reviewed literature identifying the basis of socially conforming behaviour suggests that this hypothesis is not immediately dismissable and worthy of more rigorous scientific analysis. References to individuals departing from these behaviours can be found here, here, here, here and here.

Functional Neurological Disorder (FND): Individuals suffering FND exhibit behaviours for many years and do not describe the concurrent emotions as love, peace, ecstasy and euphoria. There being no similarity between FND and the relevant behaviours and emotions, this hypothesis is dismissed.

Paid actors: Given the number of observed occurrences of the exhibited behaviours, it seems inconceivable that at least one paid actor would not have published their experiences in either paid media or a blog.  The absence of individuals claiming to be paid actors discredits this hypothesis and it is therefore dismissed.

Hypnosis: Hypnosis is defined as a human condition involving focused attention, reduced peripheral awareness, and an enhanced capacity to respond to suggestion. It is unclear from the exhibited behaviours that the process of hypnosis matches the behavioural expectations of hypnosis (Williamson, 2019; Mayo Clinic) and nor does the hypnotic induction process appear to match those in the exhibited videos.  For these reasons, this hypothesis is therefore dismissed.

Attention seeking: Attention seeking seems very likely given the nature of the YouTube based individual testimonies. Attention seeking and Conformance to the social norms appear to be related when the individual seeks to draw attention to their conformance to the social norm (see DOI:10.1111/bjso.12196, DOI:10.1353/jip.2021.0002).

Dissociative disorder: It seems less likely that anyone with a dissociative disorder would post (or would be able to) post on YouTube.

Of the nine strawman hypotheses, only Conformance to the social norms and Attention seeking avoided immediate dismissal.  Both hypotheses that avoided dismissal undoubtedly requires more formal scientific assessment, presumably by way of surveying a substantial number of individuals who have previously participated in such behaviours.
Note: No peer reviewed research was identified in the preparation of this response.  All research was therefore restricted to Wikipedia and YouTube (except where specifically identified).
A sample of resources accessed:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glossolalia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slain_in_the_Spirit
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kundalini
https://www.recoveringfromreligion.org
https://www.restorationcounselingseattle.com/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attention_seeking
https://youtu.be/SwjCuyuKf3s
https://youtu.be/F6c4BxktCdU
https://youtu.be/bZIrU7m0gx0
https://youtu.be/1YTZkHKN6l4
https://youtu.be/kD3g5rg0CqE
https://youtu.be/WaT06FX85G4
https://youtu.be/FEYW2vqqNDQ
https://youtu.be/TUvNW0ZZoDw
https://youtu.be/8L1Fslf3g2M
https://youtu.be/Q5LpMxYfHn4
https://youtu.be/G22hZ81Vku0
https://youtu.be/LDRPOxqVw90
https://www.mayoclinic.org/tests-procedures/hypnosis/about/pac-20394405
References

Burger, J. M. (2019). 13.3 Conformity and Obedience. Introduction to Psychology. https://openpress.usask.ca/introductiontopsychology/chapter/conformity-and-obedience/

Milgram, S., & Gudehus, C. (1978). Obedience to authority. Ziff-Davis Publishing Company. https://www1.psych.purdue.edu/~willia55/120/LectureSocialF10.pdf

Philippe, D., & Durand, R. (2011). The impact of norm-conforming behaviors on firm reputation. Strategic Management Journal, 32(9), 969–993. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/smj.919

Schmidt, M. F. H., Rakoczy, H., & Tomasello, M. (2019). Eighteen‐Month‐Old Infants Correct Non‐Conforming Actions by Others. Infancy: The Official Journal of the International Society on Infant Studies, 24(4), 613–635. https://doi.org/10.1111/infa.12292

Williamson, A. (2019). What is hypnosis and how might it work? Palliative Care: Research and Treatment. https://doi.org/10.1177/1178224219826581

Thanks for the super complete answer. In short the phenomenon has not been the subject of rigorous scientific research yet, the real causes of the phenomenon remain a mystery and the best we have today is educated guesses. I just have a few comments: 1) given the prevalence in most videos of an authority figure performing some form of signal that triggers these dramatic somatic reactions in people, do you think hypnosis is playing a role in all of this and should be included among the hypotheses?

In hypothesis 4 you talk about abundant cases of former experiencers of shaking and trembling who eventually ceased to have these behaviors. I think it would be helpful for the reader to  explicitly reference a few examples, say, the best 3 or 4 testimonials you found on this.

Hypnosis added as a seventh hypothesis and five testimonials included.

Not sure if this is worth being considered an 8th hypothesis, but during informal conversations with people in other sites someone put forward the idea that maybe the shaking / trembling is just the body's natural way of releasing pent up stress / anxiety / trauma, like this polar bear. I don't know if this phenomenon has a name, how common it is in humans and to what extent it could account for the details and nuances of the manifestations exhibited in the OP's examples.

What makes the original question interesting is explaining the incongruence between the self-reported emotions and the exhibited behaviours.  The emotions of stress, anxiety, fear, trauma, and confusion are congruent with collapsing, fainting, trembling, jerking and shaking.  Testing whether (and under what circumstances) some individuals conform to social norms and the directions of authority figures out of fear, confusion, stress and anxiety is itself and interesting hypothesis? The YouTube testimonials suggest that this is the case.  An interesting line of future investigation.

This video uploaded a few days ago compares and identifies interesting similarities between manifestations that have occurred in the Toronto Blessing, current Charismatic sects and Hindu Shaktipat. The uploader is Christian, so there is an evident bias to label these manifestations as demonic, but subjective interpretations aside, the similarities identified in the video might be worth considering. Maybe there is an underlying common phenomenon going on that can explain these similarities?

I found another very disturbing video where people exhibit very extreme and dramatic behaviors including body contorting reminiscent of scenes of the Exorcist movie. This video is crazy. I'm having a hard time believing "conforming to social norms" can explain it. Toward the end of the video we can even observe what appear to be children experiencing this. I'm puzzled.

On the contrary: The Milgram experiment, Stanford prison experiment, religious snake handling and religious drinking of poison show that some individuals will go to extremes to conform to social norms (even unto death).   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milgram_experiment  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_prison_experiment  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snake_handling_in_religion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drinking_the_Kool-Aid

Granted, but I still think there is a difference in this phenomenon with respect to those 4 examples. In those examples, peer pressure is acting as a strong influence on people's rationality and decision making process, and the behaviors involved are not "extraordinary": drinking, pushing a button, holding an object/animal, playing the role of a prisoner or a guard, these are not complicated things to do. In contrast, in videos like the one I just shared, we see people in hysterical states, crying, shaking, jerking, collapsing, convulsing, contorting like in the Exorcist, etc.

These emotions and behaviors are much more complicated to feel and perform. So what is still missing in my layman opinion is an explanation of how peer pressure can trigger these non-trivial emotions and behaviors in people. Is there a known mechanism by which peer pressure can make someone become hysterical, shake, jerk or contort convulsively?

Another possibility is that people who are acting hysterical, crying, shaking and trembling, etc. are just faking it all, i.e. they are basically actors displaying a fake performance out of social pressure. However, this would require everyone to be an outstanding actor (either trained or amateur, although not paid, as was argued in hypothesis 6), which I also find hard to believe.

Shaking and jerking behaviours are easy to learn and trivial to perform on command.  Although unusual, such behaviours are not complicated or extraordinary. The parsimonious explanation is that the individuals are merely performing behaviours so as to conform to group norms (hypothesis 4). Conforming behaviours are often useful (driving on the same side of the road, stopping at red lights, & brushing our teeth) but that does not imply that the emotions and behaviours align. For example, stopping at red lights when driving is sometimes frustrating, but we do so as to conform to societal norms.

(We will probably have to move this to a chat) I find it hard to believe that the following people rehearsed their behaviors to meet their groups' expectations: link, link, link. And abnormal behaviors aside, as I said before, there is an emotional component to the phenomenon also. You have people reporting electricity and in tears at the same time (link), people shaking and crying hysterically (link), etc.

There are people reporting feelings of love and peace accompanying these behaviors too (link, link). Taken together, all seems to indicate the presence of strong emotional manifestations accompanying the external behaviors. If conforming to social norms / peer pressure is the cause, you would expect emotions like fear, stress, anxiety, frustration. You would not expect individuals reporting electricity, fire, peace, love, ecstasy or crying in hysterical states.

Hypothesis 4 includes both the performance of the behaviours and the reporting of emotions such as happiness and joy.  It is likely (or at least conceivable) that the individuals do feel positive emotions due to feelings of friendship and inclusiveness. Each of the religious sects seem to have their own unique variant of behaviours indicating that the behaviours are learnt rather than an involuntary or innate response to a particular or strong emotion.  If the behaviours were involuntary reactions to hysteria (or some other emotion), the behaviours would be the same across all religious sects.

Let us continue this discussion in chat.

Tony, remember to update also the part about which hypotheses have and have not been dismissed. As it stands right know, it sounds as if attention seeking, dissociative disorder and divine intervention are all accepted as valid candidate explanations.

As the OP notes, this has been a difficult topic for Skeptics.SE. I'm going to try to answer here, but over on Skeptics this would probably be labelled as "Original Research".
The problem for Skeptics.SE is that the claim being challenged is that these shaking movements have a supernatural cause. All we can say for certain is that we can't rule out a psychological cause, but psychological or neurophysiological explanations backed by evidence don't seem to be available.
In the absence of a proper evidence-based theory of what is going on here we can only fall back on "mass hysteria", or as its more politely known these days, "mass psychogenic illness" (MPI). However this is really only a label for a bunch of phenomena that we guess are related. There is also the problem that MPI is the diagnosis used when nothing else can be found.
Having said that, Wikipedia quotes the following list of attributes of MPI outbreaks, so we can at least compare this phenomenon with it:

symptoms that have no plausible organic basis; Yes.

symptoms that are transient and benign; Yes.

symptoms with rapid onset and recovery; Yes.

occurrence in a segregated group; I think this may mean a group segregated for weeks rather than hours. On the other hand some preachers call on their congregations to separate themselves from the sinful world; it would be interesting to score these events against that criterion.

the presence of extraordinary anxiety; No. However other strong emotions are certainly present, and this might well have the same effect.

symptoms that are spread via sight, sound or oral communication; All three are present in these services, but that doesn't prove it is how this is spread.

a spread that moves down the age scale, beginning with older or higher-status people;  Unknown, but a review of videos of these events might provide data.

a preponderance of female participants. Again, the videos might provide data.

The Wikipedia article also lists medical symptoms that occur in MPI. As the OP notes, shaking and fainting is not in the list. However these events are not socially constructed as "illness", so if this is MPI it is not surprising that harmful medical symptoms are not present (although the shaking and falling does bear a resemblance to Parkinson's Disease).
In conclusion, MPI or something like it appears to be the most plausible explanation for this phenomena, and a review of videos of these events might shed further light on this.

This is an interesting plausible explanation that could be explored further, although as you acknowledge it is just speculative at the moment. However, I have some doubts. If I understand correctly, MPI would make sense in social settings where everybody is shaking and you begin to imitate the behavior. That could potentially explain the shaking and trembling observed in massive Holy Spirit revival events and similar. But what about cases where there is no one else to imitate, such as here and here ?

@SpiritRealmInvestigator Imitation doesn't need to be immediate. These people have likely seen examples in the past.

I know we would need to take their for word it, but in those examples I provided, the shaking they experienced was unprecedented for them. In the first case, the girl never experienced shaking before and the phenomenon began during the revival. In the second example, the guy was an atheist and he only had prior experience with traditional Catholicism where shaking and trembling are not common at all. I talked with  the guy in the comment section and he confirmed that he didn't know that these kinds of manifestations even existed.

The other objection I have with the MPI hypothesis is that it doesn't explain the origin of the phenomenon, only the "contagion" aspect of it. Why is there shaking and trembling in the first place? For the phenomenon to spread by contagion, there has to be an initial group of people who got the ball rolling. The shaking/trembling experienced by this pioneer group cannot be explained with imitation (because there was no else prior to them to imitate), so what caused them to shake/tremble in the first place? The MPI explanation does not address this point which I think is crucial.

Shaking and perhaps even falling (or at least "feeling faint") have been observed in panic attacks. No need to go to something more degenerative like Parkinson's. Paper on anxiety and syncope https://academic.oup.com/europace/article/17/2/309/2802537


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Do bodily manifestations (e.g. jerking) and intense euphoric sensations (e.g. "heat", "electricity") always co-occur in spiritual experiences?
After analyzing multiple reports of spiritual experiences, I've identified two general categories:

Bodily manifestations: shaking, jerking, trembling, contorting, etc. (see this related question for examples).
Intense euphoric emotions and sensations: "waves of electricity", "heat", "fire", as well as emotions such as love, peace, joy, etc. (see this related question for examples).

I know several testimonies in which both experiences (bodily manifestations and intense emotions) are reported to have happened concurrently, but I also know testimonies in which only intense emotions and sensations are reported (with no mention of bodily manifestations), and there are also many live recordings of individuals undergoing intense bodily manifestations externally, but we have no way to tell what kinds of emotions and sensations the individuals felt internally (if they felt anything at all).
In the context of spiritual experiences: are bodily manifestations and euphoric emotions and sensations independent phenomena (which may or may not co-occur), or are they inherently tied (and hence they always co-occur)?

An inherent problem with the line of investigation is that the exhibited behaviours are inconsistent with the claimed emotions.  In no other situation do the emotions of love, peace, ecstasy and euphoria result in the performance of behaviours such as glossolalia, collapsing, fainting, trembling, jerking, convulsing, contorting and shaking.  More likely causes of involuntary jerking, convulsing, contorting and shaking may include anxiety, seizure, and myoclonus. Given the incongruity and incompatibility of the emotions and behaviours, it may seem that they are entirely unrelated; however, it is possible that there is an antecedent cause of both. To assist with this analysis, the following mathematical notation is introduced:

Let R be the reporting of particular emotions (love, peace, ecstasy and euphoria).  Note, that the reported emotions may not be the actual emotions.
Let B be the performance of the behaviours (glossolalia, collapsing, fainting, trembling, jerking, convulsing, contorting and shaking).
Let C be the cause of R under certain conditions.
Let C be the cause of B under certain conditions.
Let A be the actual emotions (not necessarily the reported emotions R).

Analysis

If C always causes R and always causes B, then R and B will always co-occur.
If C causes B under certain conditions and C causes R under different conditions, then B and R will not necessarily co-occur.

Note: In this analysis, it is important to note that the reporting of emotions (R) is not the same as actually experiencing the emotions (A). For the reasons given above, it is asserted that the reported emotions (R) can not cause the behaviours (B), and by implication, the reported emotions (R) are never the same as the actual emotions being experienced (A). See dramaturgy and self-monitoring as a possible explanations of this.
In the answer to one of your earlier questions, eight strawman hypotheses were offered to explain the claimed emotions (R) and observed behaviours (B):

Unidentified invisible force.
Hysterical state induced by the leader
Hysterical state induced by the individual:
Conformance to the social norms
Functional Neurological Disorder (FND)
Paid actors
Hypnosis
Attention seeking

Of the eight hypotheses, six were excluded as being implausible, leaving only 4) Conformance to the social norms and 8) Attention seeking as being plausible explanations, which I will consider individually.
Conformance to the social norms:  In this case, the cause (C) is the desire to conform.  Whether C results in R and B would be governed by the social norms of the particular religious group.  It may be possible for one particular religious group to emphasise the reporting of emotions (R) and place less emphasis of the behaviours (B) (or vice versa), in which case, the answer to your question is “No”, that is, the observed behaviours and reported emotions do not necessarily co-occur.  However, in religious groups that emphasize both the reporting of emotions and the performance of the behaviours, then it is more than likely that both will co-occur.
Attention seeking:  In this case, the cause (C) is the desire to gain the attention of others.  Whether C results in R and B would be governed by whether the attention seeking individual assessed that either or both R and B are necessary to gain the desired attention. The attention seeking individual may be seeking the attention of only one person, a sub-group, or the entire religious group.  If the attention seeking individual is seeking the attention of the entire group, then the analysis is virtually identical to Conformance to the social norms analysed above.  If the attention seeking individual is seeking the attention of only one individual, then the attention seeking individual would assess whether B and/or R are necessary to gain the desired attention.  In this situation, it is not possible to say that R and B would always co-occur, however, if the interaction occurred in the confines of one of the relevant religious groups, then it seems more likely that the R and B would co-occur.
In conclusion, it is not necessary that the reported emotions (R) and observed behaviours (B) co-occur, however, it is likely in practice that they often do due to the social norms of the particular religious cults.

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Explanation for the "spinal energy" and other "Kundalini awakening" symptoms?
Lots of people have been sharing first-hand reports of their personal experience of the so-called "Kundalini awakening". The following are a few illustrative anecdotes:
1,
2,
3,
4,
5,
6,
7,
taken from YouTube and the subreddit on Kundalini.
Marjorie Woollacott, PhD and professor of Neuroscience and Human Physiology at the University of Oregon, has devoted part of her time to the research of the "Kundalini awakening" phenomenon. In her recent paper titled Investigation of the phenomenology, physiology and impact of spiritually transformative experiences - kundalini awakening (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32753262/), she makes the following claim:

The rationale for this study was that though there are many scientific articles published on stress reduction and increased mental function related to meditation, yoga and other tools that come from spiritual traditions, peer-reviewed research on energetic or kundalini awakenings is rare. This may be due to the phenomenology of this awakening, which does not easily fit into the current materialist scientific paradigm. Nor is it easily amenable to traditional means of scientific experimentation and measurement.

To understand why Woollacott claims this, let's look at the typical symptoms of the "Kundalini awakening" syndrome.
The most frequent and distinctive one appears to be the feeling of an "energy" or "electric current" moving up the spine toward the crown of the head. Here is a quote about this from Woollacott's paper:

Energetic awakenings are often accompanied by physiological experiences. Historical texts [6,7] and modern research [22] concur that as part of the awakening and transformative process, many individuals feel energy moving up the spine toward the crown of the head, or centered in the heart. This is frequently associated with inner sounds or an experience of radiant light, a sense of joy, or a sense of deep interconnectedness with others.

The Wikipedia article on Kundalini seconds this:

The Kuṇḍalinī experience is frequently reported to be a distinct feeling of electric current running along the spine.[8][9][10]

Other symptoms and results of the "Kundalini awakening" syndrome are summarized in the following tables and figures from the paper:
Tables

Figures

Other people holding reputable credentials who acknowledge the "Kundalini awakening" as a real phenomenon are Bonnie Greenwell (PhD) and Lawrence Edwards (PhD). Here are a couple of interviews with them: 1, 2.
Also, here is an interview Marjorie Woollacott gave to Jeffrey Mishlove, in which they discuss different aspects of the Kundalini awakening and the main conclusions of Woollacott's paper.

Bonnie Greenwell wrote a PhD dissertation titled "KUNDALINI: A STUDY OF EASTERN AND WESTERN PERSPECTIVES AND EXPERIENCES AND THEIR IMPLICATIONS FOR TRANSPERSONAL PSYCHOTHERAPISTS" (available here). She describes the phenomenon as follows:

This dissertation explores in depth the experience of kundalini awakening, a complex spiritual, psychic and physiological phenomenon which may occur in individuals spontaneously or as a result of certain spiritual practices or therapeutic processes, and discusses theories and methods which may be useful to transpersonal psychotherapists who have clients involved in this experience. People are commonly misdiagnosed and inappropriately treated by therapists and physicians when having this experience.
The dissertation identifies seven major ways in which kundalini phenomena is manifest, usually over a period of years---samadhi experiences; pranic activity which includes a wide range of body movements, vibrations, and temperature changes; spontaneous production of yogic postures or hand movements, yogic breaths, mantras or other sounds and symbols; sudden apparent physical illnesses, pains and eating difficulties; emotional upheavals, often accompanied by fear of death or insanity; seeing visions or hearing inner voices and sounds; and acquiring of psychic abilities or other occult powers.
The study reviews classical yogic literature on kundalini, and presents facts and commentaries on 23 case histories, 14 from Eastern and Western literature and 9 obtained from in-depth interviews with Western people who appeared to experience kundalini awakening.

QUESTION: What is a scientific explanation for the symptoms of the "Kundalini awakening" syndrome, such as the feeling of an "energy" moving up along the spine, vibrations, electric currents, heat, euphoria / bliss, spontaneous yogic postures, among others?

May I ask why the downvote? Isn't this a legitimate question about a commonly reported phenomenon? If something is wrong with the question, please let me know by commenting below. I'm open to constructive criticism.

I am not the downvoter, but I fear that even with well sourced questions, the research you study is going to attract a lot of downvotes in a scientific stack like this. Pretty much most of the "spirit realm" is considered pseudoscientific. There may be real phenomena which cannot be explained by science as of yet, but the hard scientific minds of some here will dismiss any possibility of it being real until it is able to be observed scientifically. As Kundalini has its roots in Hinduism, maybe Hinduism.SE is the best site for this question?

Having said that, looking into the issue, questions under the tag [tag:spirituality] are on-topic as the tag is for questions relating to spirituality within the fields of Cognitive Science of Religion and Neurotheology/Spiritual Neuroscience

Sounds a bit like non-epileptic pseudo seizures (PNES).

I'm pretty sure that some of these sensations like vibrations, euphoria / bliss are the same ones experienced by meditators attaining altered states of consciousness (Jhanas in Buddhist terminology). Here is some info on what happens in the brain during such experiences https://www.hindawi.com/journals/np/2013/653572/
BTW, I'm also surprised why is this question being downvoted.

Here a study behind the light visions https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3879457/

I love this question. I have a reason for it. I can't able to ask a well document question like you. I experienced one of this and asked a question which has been closed. https://psychology.stackexchange.com/questions/24383/reason-for-experiencing-electric-current-flowing-through-body-during-sleep-from. I don't know why most of the researchers does not encourage research of this kind.

@ChrisRogers Yeah, I agree that Hinduism is the best site. If experiences happen in presence of a guru, the guru can assist the aspirant. But if the experiences happen without a guru, the individual may be helpless since they cannot find related scientific content immediately. They are real phenomenon and I feel that science has to focus more on these.

Perhaps you could contact the authors of the various papers you have cited.  In my experience, authors are love to know that others have enjoyed reading their works and very happy to discuss.  Try dropping them an email.

@TonyMobbs - your suggestion proved to be very fruitful :-)

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/


text:
To what extent are testimonies of "spiritual experiences" reliable?
After reading/watching hundreds of testimonies of people sharing their own personal spiritual experiences, and after analyzing how different skeptics react to these testimonies, I've come to the conclusion that there are two extremes that in my opinion should be equally avoided: 1) believing 100% of what a testimony says and 2) dismissing 100% of what a testimony says. The reason is that testimonies typically present an account of personal experiences entangled with the individual's own interpretation of those experiences. The experiences themselves, devoid of any interpretation, are the "raw data" of the testimony, whereas the interpretation parts are biased by the individual's previous beliefs.
Take for example a person relaying their own personal experience of the Kundalini awakening. The "raw data" of the testimony would be the experiences themselves, e.g. feeling an intense vibration/electric current running up the spine, feeling bliss, ecstasy, etc. On the other hand, claims such as "I opened my heart chakra", "I awakened the Kundalini energy", etc. would be part of the individual's own interpretation of those experiences.
My current personal opinion is that testimonies can provide valuable insights if we are careful enough to distinguish between these two aspects. However, I'm saying this based on the assumptions that people are generally 1) honest and 2) more or less reliable when it comes to reporting raw personal experiences, e.g. their emotions, their symptoms, their physical sensations, what they heard, what they saw, etc. (again, making sure to remove as much "biased interpretations" from the reports as possible and just keeping the "raw experience" parts).
Are my assumptions accurate? Are there psychological studies discussing the reliability of witnesses when it comes to reporting their own personal experiences? What about reporting their own "spiritual experiences"? Under which circumstances are testimonies of spiritual experiences more reliable?
* Note: a possibly related question for the interested reader.

I think your assumptions lack foundation when using internet testimony.  There are many potential biases and confounding factors.  An obvious example bias is that Google promotes videos that generate profits, thus suppressing videos that individuals do not take vicarious pleasure in watching.  Perhaps starting with a layman's guide to bias would be a starting point:   Your approach to this analysis is known as a retrospective study for which biases are a recognised issue.

@TonyMobbs: "An obvious example bias is that Google promotes videos that generate profits, thus suppressing videos that individuals do not take vicarious pleasure in watching" - which can be easily overcome by finding testimonies from incipient channels with very few views, but I agree, it's a bias one has to be aware of.

Are you confident that YouTube has a fair representation of all perspectives?  Is it possible that only those with a bias are motivated to upload videos? Your assumptions can not be relied upon until you further consider the pitfalls of retrospective studies and take steps to mitigate the obvious biases.

@TonyMobbs - You can find complementary testimonies on other platforms, such as reddit, which may help to mitigate those potential biases. The thing I like about videos though is that it generally requires individuals to be more serious about what they are sharing because they are showing their face to the world, so there is a greater degree of commitment involved in my opinion. It generally adds a bit more credibility to the testimonies.


text:
Is fasting an effective method to overcome substance addictions?
I recently watched a testimony of a man who reports the results of a 40-day water/juice fast (no food). The individual claims to have been addicted to drugs for 22 years, including marijuana, cocaine, mushrooms, LSD, ecstasy, prescription pain pills and alcohol. He went cold turkey, abstaining from both food and addictive substances during the 40-day fast. After the fast, he reports complete freedom and no relapses.
This particular case raised my interest in the potential benefits of fasting in the addiction recovery arena. After a quick search I found this site which claims that:

Fasting is by far the most sophisticated willpower workout available. If you get good at fasting, you can learn to control every other aspect of your life. If you get good at fasting, you can overcome any addiction, not matter how deeply imbedded. Medically, fasting has been found to rapidly dissipate the craving for nicotine, alcohol, caffeine and other drugs.

Is it true that any addiction can be overcome with the skills learnt by fasting? Are there studies on the effectiveness of fasting for overcoming substance addictions or any other addiction for that matter?

For one thing, psilocybin/psilocin and LSD are generally considered to be non-addictive substances, which makes me question this anecdote.

AliceD: You're of course right about psilocybin/LSD not being addictive substances. However, from my experience with addiction patients, some people can have a mixed substance misuse pattern, in which there can be some compulsive use also of those drugs. So for me, that doesn't make the anecdote questionable. But I wonder if the OP has considered doing a google or pubmed search before asking the question here?

I think it would not take nearly as much effort to find people who successfully abstained from abusing drugs for 40 days and kept up without relapses afterwards, without any additional food fast. That said, cold-turkey withdrawal for alcohol for someone who consumes at a high level can be very dangerous and would not be medically advisable.

I wonder what the morbidity and mortality rates are for long-term fasting?  If overcoming addiction were as simple, inexpensive, and efficacious as fasting, it could be expected that this would be overwhelmingly reported.  A two-minute google scholar search showed nothing. Another way to look at this is to hypothesise that anyone with sufficient motivation to fast for 40 days would also have sufficient motivation to overcome other forms of addiction.

Looking at this article would make me think that fasting is a type of cognitive therapy? It may be also that you are reducing the intake of substance less and less over a period of time therefore also weaning due to the fasting times.

Is it true that any addiction can be overcome with the skills learnt by fasting?

Perhaps for some people, but different people have different levels of craving for food and other pleasurable substances. And drugs may further influence this

Substances like heroin may compete with food in the brain activating reward pathways and increasing dopamine receptor’ availability, thus suppressing the appetite and leading to lower body weight.

As a personal anecdote, I can easily water fast for many days, but I find going a full day without cannabis or other addictive substances to be extremely challenging, so this is definitely not true for all people. Drug addicts tend to be skinnier than the general populations, consume less food and have lower appetite.

In the short term, opiates cause anorexia, decreased food consumption, and reduced gastrointestinal motility, all leading to malnutrition and increased risk of infections in the long term.

And stimulant users such as meth addicts can easily go days without eating due from simply being too focused on other things to even think about food.

This answer provides some good context. Fasting while intoxicated or after substance use does not always require self-control.

Yes as it focuses the mind on a more primary need. So instead of seeking escapism and distraction of addictions, one becomes overwhelmingly obsessed with the idea of eating. This can overshadow the need to fulfill an addictive behavior and if maintained long enough (say a couple of weeks) can be enough to detach from the behavior as the self-reinforcing cycle is broken. Hunger is really powerful.

Welcome to Psychology.SE. Please visit our site [tour]. There are a lot of bold claims in your answer without corroborated evidence. We work differently to many SE sites, where we have a strict policy that all answers should be backed up with reliable references so that the answer can be independently verified, regardless of the reader's/answerer's background. If you still have trouble with this, feel free to visit the [help] or [meta]. Unreferenced claims can be challenged and lead to deletion of your answer.


text:
What research suggests that people grasp information better when arranged in groups of three?
The author didn't cite any source for this "Research into communications theory".

      Why should you aim for two or three major points? Research into
communications theory suggests that people grasp information better
when it is arranged in groups of three. While you need not adhere
to this rule slavishly, a three-tiered argument gives the appearance
of balance and strength.7 In addition, it is unlikely that all seven or
eight points will really stand alone: no fact pattern is that complex.
It is much more likely that some of those points can be combined
in some way and those that cannot are either mere spectres or too
minor to merit a mention.

Page 17. Stacie Strong BA English literature (UC Davis 1986), MPW (USC 1990), JD (Duke 1994), PhD Law (Cambridge 2002), DPhil (Oxford 2003). How to Write Law Essays & Exams 5th Edition (2018).  p 47.


text:
How to distinguish introvert personality, social anxiety disorder and mild autism?
There are the following similarities between introvert personality type, Social anxiety disorder and mild autism

Disinterest in social interaction
Interested in objects than people
May be afraid of being centre of attention
Have difficulty in people skills
May lack eye contact
May have special interest and hyperfocus
Have difficulty guessing others' mind

How to distinguish these conditions are due to  introvert personality, social anxiety disorder and mild autism?

Related: https://medicalsciences.stackexchange.com/questions/25460/how-to-distinguish-mental-illness-and-neurodevelopmental-disorders

Related: https://psychology.stackexchange.com/questions/24329/what-is-the-difference-in-meaning-between-introversion-and-at-least-some-of-the

There is an ongoing debate as to whether it is best to view personality disorders as being categorical or dimensional in nature. Your question infers the perspective of the categorical view.  The alternative dimensional perspective suggests that the three disorders you mention are very similar, that is, these three conditions overlap to a large extent with a slight shift along an (as yet unnamed) dimension.
Hopwood, C. J., Kotov, R., Krueger, R. F., Watson, D., Widiger, T. A., Althoff, R. R., Ansell, E. B., Bach, B., Michael Bagby, R., Blais, M. A., Bornovalova, M. A., Chmielewski, M., Cicero, D. C., Conway, C., De Clercq, B., De Fruyt, F., Docherty, A. R., Eaton, N. R., Edens, J. F., … Zimmermann, J. (2018). The time has come for dimensional personality disorder diagnosis. Personality and Mental Health, 12(1), 82–86. https://doi.org/10.1002/pmh.1408

The 3 said conditions look very similar, but their meaning is different.  but they indicate different parameters or different directions. Overlap can happen, such as an "introvert autistic" or an "extrovert autistic"

Introversion is an aversion or avoidance of social situations.
Social anxiety is a fear of social situations.
Autism is an extremely broad range of conditions, which may include inability to process social information.
How does they differ?
Introversion: It is sort of very old term, very broad and general one.

Introversion does not necessarily include an inability to process social information. Rather it is seen that many introverts are better in predicting how others feel at social context.

Introversion does not also necessarily mean a fear and/or shyness of social situation.

Social anxiety disorder (Social phobia) means a fear of social situation.

Social anxiety does not necessarily mean a lack of social understanding.

Social anxiety may be seen from very young age or may develop at a later age due to trauma, stress, etc.

Social anxiety disorder typically starts in childhood or adolescence.
Among individuals who seek treatment as adults the median age of onset
is in the early to mid-teens with most people having developed the
condition before they reach their 20s. However, there is a small
subgroup of people who develop the condition in later life. Some
people can identify a particular time when their social anxiety
disorder started and may associate it with a particular event (for
example, moving to a new school or being bullied or teased).
--- Social Anxiety Disorder: Recognition, Assessment and Treatment. NICE Clinical Guidelines, No. 159. National Collaborating Centre for Mental Health (UK).Leicester (UK): British Psychological Society; 2013. NCBI Bookshelf

Social anxiety is also linked with Avoidant personality disorder.

Autism seemingly is a genetically determined set of conditions, although it invites bullying, discrimination, hatred etc that may further intensify social anxiety.

The word autistic comes from the word "autos" that mean "self"; but this self-limiting does not necessarily comes from an aversion of people, but it generally comes from an inherent lack of social understanding. There may be deficit of understanding other people's intentions and mindsets ("lack of cognitive empathy") or may have an unusual or  different "theory of mind"; may have context blindness i.e. an inability to process how the same task evoke different reactions at different social contexts.

Autistics may have a problem understanding or using nonverbal communication such as posture, gesture, proxemics, etc.

Autistic people often want friend, and often forge for friend. The social aversion or friendship aversion may be secondary; due to misunderstandings, failed communications, rejection, trauma etc.

Autism often comes with one or more co-morbid disabilities like dyslexia, dyscalculia, dysgraphia, developmental coordination disorder, pragmatic language disorder, nonverbal learning disorder, prosopagnosia etc.

Notably, Due to pressure from society, autistics may develop various masking mechanisms and tricks (such as laughing when everybody laughs, force maintain eye contact, force greetings etc) so that they appear less neurodivergent.
The take-home message is that, the psychologist/ psychiatrist who have to distinguish the 3 conditions need to be utmost cautious and aware not just the behaviour but the inherent cognitive 'reason' behind the symptoms.

The reference to "extrovert autistic" is to a media article.  From my perspective that is like saying a black version of white. It would be great if you could provide references for your assertions (or quotations?)  Alternatively, are you answering your own question?

No, I am adding some perspectives only. Look, I havenot accepted my own answer. Yes I have to search better reference.

Here is an article which is very helpful for finding information about What is Avoidant personality disorder & social anxiety. I personally found it very informative because i have seen that many people around me who suffered. https://sympdisease.com/what-is-avoidant-personality-disorder-social-anxiety/#Is_avoidant_personality_disorder_an_anxiety_disorder


text:
How to distinguish mental illness and neurodevelopmental disorders?
It looks like mental illness and neurodevelopmental disorders may look absolutely same if we superficially  observe the behaviour.
Example:

Anger, destructive behaviour can be either due to a mental illness (anxiety, panic disorder, mood disorders, etc) and also can be a meltdown that is seen in neurodevelopmental conditions (Autism, Aspergers, ADHD, SPD etc).

Stereotypy and stimming behaviour can occur due to either mental illness like OCD and severe anxiety or it may have a neurodevelopmental origin.

Anxiety itself, can be either of a psychological origin (such as either fear of something irrational, or just a state of fear), or it may have a neurodevelopmental origin such as the patient of ADHD or Aspergers or SPD can not handle a overstimulated state and may feel anxious if they have to wait for uncertain period.

There are a lot of other similarities between neurodevelopmental and psychological conditions.
Now suppose the scene a patient comes in the chamber of a General Physician/ Psychiatrist with complaints of restlessness, anxiety, depression, psychosomatic illness (nausea, headache, numbness), forgetfulness, lack of concentration etc. The general symptoms signal either a primarily psychological condition, or may have a neurodevelopmental origin. How the General Physician / psychiatrist should distinguish it?

I don't think it makes much sense to distinguish between mental illness and neurodevelopmental disorders as separate categories.

For "the American way" see https://www.appi.org/Products/DSM-Library/DSM-5-Handbook-of-Differential-Diagnosis

Make them an answer.

As @BryanKrause said; mental illness and neurodevelopmental conditions are not distinctively separable.
Example: Neurodevelopmental hypothesis of schizophrenia,
Obsessions and compulsions in Asperger syndrome and high-functioning autism
Etc.


text:
Can an autistic person have very advance language skills?
Can an autistic person have very advanced language skills (Verbal communication, not about tonal nor body language skill, nor the written verbal language, I keep dyslexia out of this discussion for sake of specificity) and a very Early age of first talk, while having other autism symptoms?
Notably there are a few blogs and many social media posts that writes about "hyperverbal autistics" but I did not find scientific literature about hyperverbal autistic people.

Bounty note: There are confusions over autism and language acquisition. It is widely believed that autistics either cannot speak or have a delayed and/or poor language acquisition. But some (proponents of asperger subtype) says an early and/or advance language skill may happen in autism. By DSM merger of all autism subtypes into ASD it means a subset of Autistics (the former 'Aspergers') may possess advanced language skills. What is the current scientific view on this contradiction?

Some clarifications: Is your question about language skills or verbal skills?  It is certainly possible to have normal literacy skills while verbal skills are impaired for example.  Also, what is missing in your answer below?  It seems to cover the relationship of autism and asperger's quite well.

@ArnonWeinberg Verbal communication I mean. In my answer what I miss is updatation. Asperger is an old term. Is there any scientific literature that discusses the "hyperverbal" things relates to autism/ autism spectrum?

They may be referring to hyperlexia (rather than hyperverbal ability):

Hyperlexic children are characterized by word-reading ability well
above what would be expected given their age. ... Some experts believe
that most children with hyperlexia, or perhaps even all of them, lie
on the autism spectrum.

But as far as verbal ability goes, since autism is a spectrum disorder, there is bound to be a spectrum of verbal abilities in those afflicted.  Wikipedia summarizes:

Language impairment is also common in children with autism, but it is
not necessary for the diagnosis. ... It is also common for individuals
with ASD to communicate strong interest in a specific topic, speaking
in lesson-like monologues about their passion instead of enabling
reciprocal communication with whomever they are speaking to.

In other words, "hyperverbal" autistics are hardly unusual.  However, they often struggle with perspective-taking, and hence may speak out of turn, failing to assess their audience's level of interest.
For recent reviews of language acquisition and verbal abilities in individuals with ASD, see for example:
Eigsti et al (2011); "Language acquisition in autism spectrum disorders: A developmental review":

... early studies indicated that some 50% of affected individuals
never acquire functional speech, though more recent estimates find a
smaller proportion of non-verbal individuals, typically around 25%.
Language acquisition in ASD is characterized by dramatic delays, with
first words produced at age 38 months, on average, compared to 8–14
months in TD.

Volkers (2017); "Untangling the Language Challenges of Autism":

... on average, children on the spectrum produce their first word one
to two years later than typically developing children. And we know
that language ability among children on the spectrum varies
greatly—some may be fluent conversationalists, while others can barely
speak.

You wrote, 'In other words, "hyperverbal" autistics are hardly unusual' what is meaning of Hardly unusual? is it "very usual" (double negative)? or it means "strongly unusual"?

It means "not particularly unusual" or "somewhat usual".  They are not the majority, but not rare either.

Yes, this may happen with Asperger subtype of autism.

AS had already been described in 1981 by Lorna Wing, who first
proposed the term to refer to a special subgroup of children who,
according to Asperger’s original description, were characterized by:
social isolation and lack of reciprocity in social interactions;
normal or precocious language acquisition, with above-average
linguistic skills but subtle abnormalities of verbal and non-verbal
communication (e.g., atypical syntax, pedantic vocabulary and absent
or stereotyped prosody); a narrow focus of interests, often restricted
to unpragmatic and highly original themes; overachievement in specific
cognitive domains; and motor clumsiness (Wing, 1981).

--- A Concise History of Asperger Syndrome: The Short Reign of a Troublesome Diagnosis; by J. B. Barahona-Corrêa and Carlos N. Filipe (PMC)
Some authors claimed that Asperger subtype is characterised by no obvious language delay.

One approach to resolve this question has been to adopt the criterion
of absence of clinically significant language or cognitive delay —
essentially, the “absence of language delay.”

--- Can Asperger syndrome be distinguished from autism? An anatomic likelihood meta-analysis of MRI studies; by Kevin K. Yu, Charlton Cheung,  Gráinne M. McAlonan (PMC)
I did not found research articles about very early talkers, but some internet article claims very early talkers sometimes experience social deficits but without explicite mention of ASD.
such as https://www.huffpost.com/entry/9-truths-about-early-talk_b_8137426/amp
Update:
In Phonology and vocal behavior in toddlers with autism spectrum disorders (PMC full text) it has been said that

In terms of phonological development, articulation is often reported
to be normal or even precocious in children with ASD who speak
(Kjelgaard & Tager-Flusberg, 2001; Pierce & Bartolucci, 1977),
although Rapin, Dunn, Allen, Stevens and Fein (2009) and Cleland,
Gibbon, Peppé, O'Hare and Rutherford (2010) showed a range of patterns
of speech and language behavior to be present in school-aged children
with ASD.

(Although they discusses other anomalies in language development)
in Early language and communication development of infants later diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder it is said that

Overall, this prospective study confirms that delays in communication
and language development are apparent early in life in children with
ASD, and emphasizes that developmental surveillance should include
monitoring for delays in gesture, which may be among the earliest
signs of ASD.

As an Autistic person myself, and as a person knowing many autistic people, I can assure you we indeed are capable of language. Even very low functioning autistic individuals are at least somewhat capable of speech, this is not true in all cases, of course; but it is not, in the majority of cases, to the degree of them being incapable of language comprehension or acquisition.
https://medicalnewstoday.com/articles/325239
https://cdc.gov/ncbddd/autism/stories.html
Here are some examples, and also, the reason you cannot find scientific papers on it is because there is no reason whatsoever to make a peer reviewed paper on the topic of Autistic people being able to understand language, as we all already know that to be the case, and already know why it is the case.
That being, Autism is a Spectrum Disorder and can have various different intensities, and even than, like all Mental Disorders, it does not always manifest in the exact same manner. For example, look at the manner used for diagnoses in the DSM-V, (https://asatonline.org/for-parents/diagnosis/)
Criterion A: social communication deficits, consisting of three items, all of which must be met to satisfy this criterion;
Criterion B: fixated interests and repetitive behaviours consisting of four items, of which at least two must be met to satisfy this criterion;
Criterion C: symptoms existing in early childhood;
Criterion D: symptoms impairing functioning; and
Criterion E impairments are not better explained by intellectual disability (intellectual developmental disorder) or global developmental delay (APA, 2011; CDC, 2014).
All five must be met, but they are all very wide in nature, and none of the criteria include impairment in general language comprehension ability, and, as the anecdotal evidence supports, one very much can have Autism and have high language ability
References:
American Psychiatric Association [APA] (2011). DSM-5 https://www.dsm5.org
Centers for Disease Control [CDC] (2014). Diagnostic Criteria for 299.00 Autism Spectrum Disorder https://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/autism/hcp-dsm.html.

I don't think OP was asking about basic capability for language, but about some sort of "very advanced language", though they were not very clear about what exactly "advanced" means.

There is very little if anything at all that an autistic can't learn once they've developed an intense interest in it.

Autism is a label reserved for people who demonstrate a socio-communication delay during early development.

The areas of language are phonology (speech sounds), semantic & orthographic (word knowledge), syntactic (grammar/morphology), discourse (conversation/narration), and pragmatic (socioemotional). Any and all areas of language (and speech) can be affected as well, but it ain't autism if there is not at least a history of pragmatic language delay at an early age.
It is not unusual for someone to present aspie-like with excellent vocabulary and grammar skills. Mine aren't "superior", but it is still surprizingly difficult for me to speak simply. Often the lack of precision almost feels like lying ;)
I am enjoying the wisdom attributed to Mark Twain: If I had had more time, I would have written a shorter letter.
...Pls excuse my ODD for just an instant: Dyslexia can coexist with autism in much the same way you could stub your toe when you had a head cold. At risk of simplifying, dyslexia affects the language area of phonology, then literacy neglect obstructs the development of the higher language levels.

Welcome to Psychology.SE. Please visit our site [tour]. There are a lot of bold claims in your answer without corroborated evidence. We work differently to many SE sites, where we have a strict policy that all answers should be backed up with reliable references so that the answer can be independently verified, regardless of the reader's/answerer's background. This meta answer will help with reliable sources. Unreferenced claims can be challenged and lead to deletion of your answer.


text:
What caused psychologists to be so wrong about the size of working memory?
They used to think that the size of working memory was 7 items, on average.
Now, according to fMRI, it's believed to be only 4.

Source: In his TED talk, around 5:20, Peter Doolittle says the estimate had to be revised:

We tend to remember about 4 things. It used to be 7. But with functional MRI, apparently, it's 4.

"7 items" is not wrong, it's an observation, specifically about 7 +/- 2 is the number of random digits that someone can hold in working memory, called "digit span".

@BryanKrause Bless your heart. Aren't you the same guy who claimed Covid survivors should still get vaccinated, despite scientific evidence that reinfection is a myth? I even deleted my account on medicalsciences, because that place was so hopeless.

Don't really want to get into the same argument about shortsightedness here. Did not realize you were that same person...

@BryanKrause I remember you, because I've literally never seen you be right. Even here, you claim that 7 is just an observation, which was limited to digits, but in fact "The Magical Number Seven, Plus or Minus Two: Some Limits on Our Capacity for Processing Information" is one of the most highly cited papers in psychology.

@bobcat It's cited because it's a useful result and an important paper that started an area of research. Not because the people citing it believe "7 is the magic size of working memory storage". It does happen to be a fairly simple paradigm, though, that is still used in IQ tests and measures of working memory in aging adults.

@BryanKrause You are missing the point, again, which is that it was an estimate of a general capacity (that was later revised), not just an observation limited to digits, as you claimed.

I believe you are also missing the points, which are that 1) citing a paper proposing a 7 item capacity does not imply that the person citing believes that is the general number applying to all cases, and 2) empirical knowledge is based on observation, so yes, before attempting other experiments, the hypothesis made by that paper was that 7 was a general number. That hypothesis was based just on the observations in the paper, much like later hypotheses that working memory has a capacity but that this capacity varies in various situations were based on observations of those phenomena.

In the TED talk he's making a joke ("memory used to be X, now it's Y!"). Likely referencing the "good ol' days" trope where one talks about how things used to be different when the comedian/speaker/audience was younger, or more specifically the tendency of memory to decrease with age.
The "span" of working memory depends on the type of "object" being remembered, how exactly it is remembered, and what other distractions or tasks are interfering. The original "7 +/- 2" paper is quite old, and although it did propose a limited working memory capacity with a particular span, I do not think it supports your claim that psychologists "used to think that the size of working memory was 7 items". Rather, in one experiment with one type of object the average was 7 items. People had to do further experiments with other types of items to find out if the span was constant over all objects; once doing those experiments, they found that it was not, but consistently found that there was some capacity beyond which it was difficult to remember more objects without more elaborate strategies or training (such as the "memory palace"/method of loci).
Wikipedia has a pretty extensive article on memory span that is probably a good place to start if you're interested in the topic. Some of the characteristics listed on that page that influence the span include relatedness of the items, distractors, rhythm and rate of how objects are presented, modality (auditory, visual, etc), motor cost (longer words take more "space"), how exactly responses are scored (total recalled? number before error? how are adjacent/similar objects scored?), and other distractions.


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Can someone get mentally retarded suddenly?
Can someone, after having anger to a large level or anxiety to a large level, develop mental retardation?
In simple words, can someone being normal and mental sound, become mentally retarded in just a moment?
Let me explain it more clearly.
Suppose someone is normal but suddenly he sees something, which makes him very anxious and tensed. He has developed anger and lost the happiness he was having.
The thing that I am trying to ask you is: can some psychological causes (thinking, anger, etc.) instantly lead to mental retardation?
By retardation, I mean
the retarding of thinking ability, planning, cognitive behaviour, and all other parameters of a well-functioning brain.
I searched on Google & found in page 2 of https://www.webmd.com/parenting/baby/intellectual-disability-mental-retardation that genetics, child birth/pregnancy problems, or head injuries are common causes, but with two-thirds of all children who have intellectual disability, the cause is unknown.

That word you are using - I don't think it means what you think it means.

I think there's a language problem here. The word "mad" in most English speaking countries means 1) angry or 2) insane. The term "mentally retarded" is completely different and means intellectually impaired. Insanity and mental retardation are very different things, so it's very unclear what you're asking. Please edit your question and clarify, and also spend some time in your favorite search engine looking up these disorders. We require questions here to demonstrate some degree of prior research.

I think you still need to do more homework on mental retardation. You're not understanding what it is. It's not something a previously normal person can acquire through any psychological cause. You're either born with it or you develop it later in life due to a brain injury, but no amount of anger or stress can cause it.

Just so you're aware, when you get this question in shape, I'm going to reopen it and then migrate it to the Psychology and Neuroscience exchange where it would be more appropriate.

Psychosis
"Mental retardation", as the answer by Shaire elucidates, is generally congenital or the result of physical trauma, but psychosis can have symptoms that significantly interfere with life and can be simply psychologically triggered, which is in the spirit of the question you asked.
More info
Psychosis, while not directly a cause of mental "retardation", can create inability to function in life [0] during the episodes and faster decline in IQ than control [1], and it can be caused by stressful life events [3]. It is also sometimes comorbid with anxiety [2].
[0] https://www.ncda.org/aws/NCDA/pt/sd/news_article/117360/_PARENT/CC_layout_details/false
[1] https://yaledailynews.com/blog/2015/01/13/iq-takes-a-hit-with-longer-lasting-psychosis/
[2] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3283146/
[3] https://www.mind.org.uk/information-support/types-of-mental-health-problems/psychosis/causes/

Just as I indicated to Shaire, it wasn't clear from a quick skim of the question, but the term "mental retardation" within the question is not the normally defined term. I have hopefully made it easier to spot.


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Why both hypokinetic and hyperkinetic changes are seen in Parkinsons?
In Parkinsons disorder the substanstia nigra pars compacta get affected and there is destruction of the dopaminergic neurons, which ultimately disturbs the direct and indirect pathways. Now we know indirect pathway is overall inhibitory to movement and direct pathway is overall stimulatory.
Now because both of these pathways are not working properly, can we consider this as a reason for both hypokinetic and hyperkinetic disorders seen in Parkinsons? Or there is some other explanation.

I am not highly proficient in neuroscience, but I managed to find the following  from Sonne et al. (2020) which may help while you wait for a more proficient answer. (Emphasis mine)

While most forms of Parkinson disease are due to the insidious degeneration of the substantia nigra over a lifetime or during old age, the cause of that degeneration is unknown. These forms of Parkinson disease are termed idiopathic due to their unknown cause. A great deal of research is being done to identify these causes, which can include peripheral inflammation,[15] metabolic insufficiency,[16] and various environmental toxins,[17][18][19] which have been shown to affect the substantia nigra. Several other neurological conditions exhibit parkinsonian-like signs and symptoms by affecting the dopaminergic neurons of the substantia nigra. These include drug-induced parkinsonism in which a patient is taking a pharmaceutical compound, such as antipsychotics and antihypertensive, that affects dopamine metabolism.

Brydon L, Harrison NA, Walker C, Steptoe A, Critchley HD. Peripheral inflammation is associated with altered substantia nigra activity and psychomotor slowing in humans. Biol Psychiatry. 2008 Jun 01;63(11):1022-9. [PMC free article] [PubMed]
Yang L, Wang H, Liu L, Xie A. The Role of Insulin/IGF-1/PI3K/Akt/GSK3β Signaling in Parkinson's Disease Dementia. Front Neurosci. 2018;12:73. [PMC free article] [PubMed]
Langston JW, Irwin I, Langston EB, Forno LS. 1-Methyl-4-phenylpyridinium ion (MPP+): identification of a metabolite of MPTP, a toxin selective to the substantia nigra. Neurosci Lett. 1984 Jul 13;48(1):87-92. [PubMed]
Gash DM, Rutland K, Hudson NL, Sullivan PG, Bing G, Cass WA, Pandya JD, Liu M, Choi DY, Hunter RL, Gerhardt GA, Smith CD, Slevin JT, Prince TS. Trichloroethylene: Parkinsonism and complex 1 mitochondrial neurotoxicity. Ann Neurol. 2008 Feb;63(2):184-92. [PubMed]
Tanner CM, Kamel F, Ross GW, Hoppin JA, Goldman SM, Korell M, Marras C, Bhudhikanok GS, Kasten M, Chade AR, Comyns K, Richards MB, Meng C, Priestley B, Fernandez HH, Cambi F, Umbach DM, Blair A, Sandler DP, Langston JW. Rotenone, paraquat, and Parkinson's disease. Environ Health Perspect. 2011 Jun;119(6):866-72. PMC free article PubMed

Reference
Sonne J, Reddy V, Beato MR. (2020) Neuroanatomy, Substantia Nigra. In: StatPearls. Treasure Island (FL): StatPearls Publishing. Available from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK536995/

The motor system has a LOT of paralell pathways. The model you state is very old and told in med school because it looks nice, but it just doesn't fit the reality. For example, there are a lot of papers trying to come up with models of tremor generation involving corticothalamic loops and beyond.
I suggest reading Motor Control chapters of this book, which is very short and introductory, but beautiful. Neurophysiology: A Conceptual Approach by R. Carpenter, fifht edition. Or you could go with Gazzaniga and even better Kandels'.

"The model you state is very old and told in med school because it looks nice, but it just doesn't fit the reality." I have a problem with this as I cannot understand why they would teach this in med school if it doesn't fit reality. Can you cite some reputable sources to back this up?

Welcome to Medical Sciences. Chris is right to ask for supporting references. We work differently than most SE sites in that we have a strict policy that all answers should be backed up with reliable references so the answer can be independently verified. You don't have to write a doctoral thesis, just enough to back up your assertions of fact. Unreferenced claims can lead to answers being deleted.


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Is being a morning person vs a night person actually a real thing or just a preference?
Are there real physical differences between a morning person vs a night person that can be measured and used to explain the difference?
Or is it just an adapted preference randomly varying from person to person?

(see also this Q&A over at Biology.SE: https://biology.stackexchange.com/questions/93965/why-do-morning-people-have-shorter-biological-clocks/93966)
It's a real thing, but that doesn't necessarily mean it's set in stone or that preferences can't be changed/learned.
At least some portion of these preferences seem to be genetic and related to regulation of circadian rhythms. In brief: animals, including humans, have a system of molecular "clocks" that keep track of roughly the length of a day. These clocks most often run naturally slightly longer than 24 hours: if you keep someone (or, preferably, a lab animal) in constant darkness, they will still keep a daily sleep/wake cycle, but it will drift over time, corresponding to a >24 hour day.
To actually follow the real cycle of day and night, light is used to resynchronize the clock every day.
If someone's "natural" clock (without light synchronization) runs a bit shorter (faster) than average, you'd expect that person would tend to feel like waking up a bit earlier as well as feeling tired a bit earlier in the evening - a morning person. If someone's natural clock runs a bit slower than an actual day, then morning will come a bit sooner than they prefer, and in the evening they won't quite feel tired yet.
That said, like most traits of this nature, the biological underpinnings of these tendencies only explain part of it, and you would not expect to find people sorted neatly into "morning" and "night" but rather to follow something like a Gaussian distribution, with most people in the middle.
Here's a recent genome-wide association study and a review of some others on "chronotype" (the morning/night preference you ask about):
Jones, S. E., Lane, J. M., Wood, A. R., van Hees, V. T., Tyrrell, J., Beaumont, R. N., ... & Weedon, M. N. (2019). Genome-wide association analyses of chronotype in 697,828 individuals provides insights into circadian rhythms. Nature communications, 10(1), 1-11.
Kalmbach, D. A., Schneider, L. D., Cheung, J., Bertrand, S. J., Kariharan, T., Pack, A. I., & Gehrman, P. R. (2017). Genetic basis of chronotype in humans: insights from three landmark GWAS. Sleep, 40(2).


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What evidence is there for successful posthypnotic suggestion where the subject carries out a suggested action upon a trigger without knowing why?
What evidence is there for successful posthypnotic suggestion where a subject carries out an action that was suggested to them under hypnosis, not only upon the suggested trigger but also without consciously knowing, before they do it or at the moment they do it, why they are doing it? For example they might do it

when somebody says something to them,
when they hear a specified non-verbal sound, such as a clap or a whistle, or
when a certain time of day is reached.

I am interested in the case when in the waking state they do not consciously decide to do the action, and when, in addition to this, it is not the kind of reflex or other action that they would have done normally had it not been for the hypnosis.
This question is not about what goes through their mind after they have done the action, not even very soon after. Perhaps they "find" a rational reason for having done it that does not feature hypnosis, or they may be puzzled about why they did it, or they may reason right away that it must have been suggested to them during hypnosis, or perhaps they suddenly remember the actual making of the suggestion during the hypnotic session. Another possibility is that they don't recognise that they have done it. But that's not the question.

Does this answer your question? How is hypnosis not mind control?

@ChrisRogers - No. The answer to that question is interesting on how some posthypnotic actions are similar to involuntary actions in the subjective assessment of time duration made by their subjects, but there is nothing explicit in it about how the subjects consciously view or do not view the motivation for their actions.

How about this one: Is it really impossible for a hypnotist to make a participant do something against their will?


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In non-human animals, does general intelligence apply?
In humans, there is this concept of general intelligence, which says that if someone is smarter than you then they are smarter than you at all activities that rely on intelligences.
Do other animals also have general intelligences? Or do their brains simply specialize in one area of intelligence. So for example, dogs are considered smarter than cats because they are better at being trained to do stuff. Does that mean that dogs are smarter than cats in all activities that require intelligences, or are dogs simply better at this one thing, which is following instructions from a human?

"which says that if someone is smarter than you then they are smarter than you at all activities that relies on intelligence" - that's not what general intelligence is or does. General intelligence is the idea that scores on different tests of intelligence are correlated; that's it. It doesn't really make sense to apply it to species differences.

Also see Have IQ-type measures been tried for other animals?  Also, this post I think answers your question, but unfortunately, the corresponding question is closed.


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If you can't draw, is that an indication of low spatial IQ?
People who can draw obviously can visualize space and objects in their mind. Therefore, people who can't draw obviously cannot. So does that mean that people who can't draw must have low spatial IQ?

What exactly do you mean with 'can't draw'? Do you mean making an artistic expression with esthetic quality, or down to drawing simple shapes, like a rectangle?

I meant for example being able to draw a human hand or something. I do not mean drawing in the artistic sense. I simply mean the ability to draw a realistic 2D representation on paper of any object from memory.

I don't want to nitpick, but what is a 'realistic' hand? A circle with 5 ovals as it faithfully depicts its overall shape? Or does it have to include 3 joints on the fingers, two on the thumb, pores, nails etc etc. I think it all depends on how you define 'realistic'. And drawing a hand from memory is difficult since you need it to draw the hand in the first place: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drawing_Hands

The problem is that there are tests based on drawing, but they are to assess other things such as neglect syndrome. Check clock-drawing for neglect so you might be able to explain better what you mean by not able to the draw. Anyway, it might be useful to say that spatial IQ is the ability to perform mental representation and changes of spaces, so no mention of drawing.

"Therefore, people who can't draw obviously cannot." That's definitely not the case. A person might be able to visualize objects and even manipulate them in their mind (elongation, rotation, etc.) but not be able to reproduce this on paper. Doesn't imply that they have low IQ

@SerenaD when you are talking about neglect there, you need to be clear you are talking about spacial neglect (a behavioral syndrome occurring after brain injury). Saying just neglect can be interpreted as something completely different.

Spatial IQ refers to the ability to perform navigation tasks, mental representation, and mental rotation of objects. Therefore, if you have a clear idea or 3D model in mind of what you want to draw but you are not able to reproduce it on paper, I would say does not mean you have a low spatial IQ.
Simple answer:
No. Bad drawing does not mean low spatial IQ
However, the inability of drawing can depend on other factors. Check Neglect syndrome and clock-drawing test.

Please can you cite some reputable sources of information to back your claims? Plus, when you are talking about neglect there, you need to be clear you are talking about spacial neglect (a behavioral syndrome occurring after brain injury). Saying just neglect can be interpreted as something completely different.


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What is the minimum spatial IQ needed to solve the rubik's cube?
Solving the rubki's cube is bona fide spatial IQ challenge.
Has there been studies done on the minimum spatial IQ score needed to solve it?
EDIT:
By solve, I mean to discover the algorithm by oneself.

I was wondering this myself and I can't find a solution. I am 42 and I've owned a Rubik's cube since I was 16.  I refuse to look up solution algorithms.  I can solve the top and second layers by steps I've figured out on my own, but there have been just to many steps to recall and process to finish the last level, but I've been close needing to swap only 2x pieces.  I don't fiddle with this a lot but maybe 2-3 times a year, where I'll fiddle with the thing at my desk between tasks, and I'll do this for a week before I give up.  I hope to one day crack it. We'll see.

I don't think it's a matter of IQ, really. Here's why: The Rubik's cube can be solved easily following a simple algorithm. Anyone can follow this step-by-step process mindlessly and solve a Rubik's cube. Remembering the algorithm is a different thing altogether, maybe that depends on a person's IQ (does memory depend on IQ?) There are many bots that can solve the Rubik's cube in a matter of seconds, just following this algorithm. So, it actually doesn't need much IQ I guess, but considering that the algorithm generally starts from the step after one side (usually black/white/yellow) is completed, a person should have enough IQ to be able to solve one face of the cube and remember the steps, so I am guessing that the IQ measure would be around the room temperature in Celsius scale!

I appreciate the attempt to answer this question but this isn't the answer.  The question asker (and myself) are curious about what type of intellect it take to naturally figure out steps or algorithms to solve a cube, without assistance from others.  Yes, there are plenty of solutions and some can solve puzzles in remarkably few turns.  But for someone who wants to go in "cold" with no knowledge of cube solutions, what intellect does it take to figure this thing out?  As I commented above, I can get close... but I still can't solve this thing after 24 years (again, without assistance.)


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Why do larger animals need bigger brains?
For example, we can assume that the average house cat is equally intelligent as the average tiger. The average tiger is about 100 times heavier than the average house cat. But its brain is also bigger than the house cat's brain. Since the tiger isn't any more intelligent than the average house cat, why does it need a bigger brain?

Brain size isn't necessarily a determinant of intelligence. That notion was a  assumption of neuroscientists of the past, a speculation that lead to many problematic socio-psychological projections.
The size difference of brains might simply match the morphology of the species, but sometimes it doesn't scale so evenly, as with crocodiles, whose brains remain roughly the same size their whole lives even as their bodies grow. I personally wonder if this relates to the hypothesis that brains evolved to meet the need for movement (the "moving hypothesis").
Often larger animals have larger brains to fit their morphology, but they don't necessarily have more neurons. Having more neurons might be the reason for the greater intelligence (or, perhaps a better phrasing, greater cognitive flexibility) of species like Homo sapiens. This hypothesis is explained in detail in Suzana Herculano-Houzel's paper "Brains matter, bodies maybe not: The case for examining neuron numbers irrespective of body size" http://www.suzanaherculanohouzel.com/herculano-houzel-2011-anyas/


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Psychological explanation for uncontrollable laughter and apparent symptoms of drunkenness in charismatic Christian congregations?
Holy laughter and spiritual drunkenness are two very correlated experiences that have been reported many times in charismatic Christian congregations. Quoting Wikipedia:

Holy laughter is a term used within charismatic Christianity that describes a religious behaviour in which individuals spontaneously laugh during church meetings. It has occurred in many revivals throughout church history, but it became normative in the early 1990s in Neo-charismatic churches and the Third Wave of the Holy Spirit. Many people claimed to experience this phenomenon at a large revival in Toronto, Ontario, Canada known as the Toronto Blessing.

Spiritual drunkenness refers to a phenomenon seen in some Christian denominations, particularly those associated with Pentecostalism and the Charismatic Movement, in which individuals who are said to be experiencing intense momentary visitations of—or even possession by—the Holy Spirit exhibit a range of behaviors resembling signs of moderate to severe alcoholic inebriation, including unsteadiness, uncontrollable laughter, silly expressions or gestures, verbal or nonverbal shouting (not typically in the form of glossolalia), sudden intense fatigue, and temporary unconsciousness. The phenomenon typically occurs during Pentecostal and charismatic church services, usually at the prompting of a preacher or pastor, and most often involving multiple members of a congregation at a time, generally after having been "transferred" from one person to another via respiratory blowing or laying on of hands.

The phenomenon has been videotaped, and after some searching I managed to find quite a few illustrative examples. Here are some: example 1, example 2, example 3, example 4, example 5, example 6, example 7, example 8, example 9, example 10, example 11.
Question: what is a psychological explanation for uncontrollable laughter and apparent symptoms of drunkenness in charismatic Christian congregations?

Possibly related question: Can a person be hypnotized to act drunk?

Addendum
This is what I was able to find after spending some time on Google Scholar:
The Global Pentecostalization of Christianity and its Ethical Consequences (link)
A Kobylinski - Chicago Studies, 2016 - academia.edu

One of the phenomena typical for Pentecostal spirituality are psychosomatic symptoms, occurring during many prayer meetings in the form of convulsions, spasmodic laughter, or what is called resting in the Spirit. Andrzej Migda points out that, in the psychology of religion, such behaviours are classified as manifestations of “altered states of consciousness.” He believes that the “Pentecostal psychosomatic phenomena occur due to the same psychic mechanisms that enable shaman trances, walking on hot coals, or dervish dancing.” New members of charismatic communities are trained in achieving such ecstatic and mystical states.

I looked up Andrzej Migda, who is cited as the source of the claim, and found out that, according to https://pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pentekostalizm, he appears to be one of several Polish researchers who have investigated the Pentecostal movement:

The leading researcher of the Pentecostal movement was Walter J. Hollenweger (1927–2016), called "the founding father of research on pentecostalism." In his honor, in 2002 , the Center for Interdisciplinary Studies on Pentecostalism and Charismatic Movements was established at the Free University of Amsterdam . Hollenweger (Hollenweger Center for Interdisciplinary Studies of Pentecostalism and Charismatic Movements), which is a leading research center on this religious phenomenon [45] . In Poland, studies on pentecostalism are dealt with, among others, by prof. Zbigniew Pasek [46] , prof. Andrzej Siemieniewski , Dr. Edward Czajko , Dr. Leszek Jańczuk , Dr.Marek Kamiński , Dr. Andrzej Migda , Dr. Henryk Ryszard Tomaszewski or Fr. dr hab. Andrzej Kobyliński.

I then tried to search for peer-reviewed publications by these authors, but couldn't find anything conclusive about "holy laughter" or "spiritual drunkenness". To be honest, I am not aware of any peer-reviewed publication that has scientifically investigated the causes of these phenomena.

Please see https://psychology.stackexchange.com/questions/25631/is-there-a-scientific-explanation-for-dramatic-body-shaking-and-trembling-in-rel/25800#25800

@TonyMobbs - what are your thoughts on Andrzej Migda's explanation, that these individuals are supposedly in an "altered state of consciousness" or "trance"?

Altered states of consciousness (ASC) is unparsimonious. Almost anything can be written of as ASC. Defining consciousness continues to be a vexing problem, so defining an altered state is doubly vexatious.  Try Schmidt TT and Berkemeyer H (2018) The Altered States Database: Psychometric Data of Altered States of Consciousness. Front. Psychol. 9:1028. https://10.3389/fpsyg.2018.01028 and Solms M. The Hidden Spring: A Journey to the Source of Consciousness. 2021. https://www.amazon.com.au/Hidden-Spring-Journey-Source-Consciousness/dp/0393542017


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Do people with sociopathy, neuroticism need medical attention?
Do people with sociopathy, neuroticism need medical attention? I thought people with dark traits don't need medication unless it causes them to have problem functioning in society like working with other people and getting along with their colleagues. Most DSM V definitions seem to suggest that they're not conditions that need medical attention unless it does cause them difficulty functioning. I am correct in saying this, how am I wrong if I am wrong?

Welcome to Psychology.SE. Please feel free to view the site [tour]. What do you mean by medical help? Pharmaceutical intervention? Or do you include talking therapies? Sociopathy and neuroticism are 2 distinctly different problems. Which would you like to focus on with this question and what have you read which makes you think someone with that problem can possibly carry on without some kind of intervention?

"Need" maybe too strong a term. Perhaps consider "need" versus "would benefit from". A common goal is to increase happiness. Sociopathy and neuroticism seem at odds with happiness. Therefore, seeking help (medical or psychological) may overcome hinderances to achieving happiness.