Places that break your brain
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Places That Break Your Brain — Daily trivia Tuesday, September 15, 2026: questions and answers
All 10 questions with answers and explanations. Play this daily
Q 01Which syndrome describes hostages who come to side with their captors?
- AStockholm syndrome
- BParis syndrome
- CMunchausen syndrome
- DTourette syndrome
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Stockholm syndrome
Stockholm syndrome, named after a 1973 bank siege there. Despite its fame, it isn't an official mental health diagnosis.
Q 02Which condition can leave climbers high on Mount Everest confused and seeing things?
- AFrostbite
- BSnow blindness
- CWindburn
- DAltitude sickness
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Altitude sickness
Altitude sickness. In severe cases, low oxygen makes the brain swell, and the only sure cure is to get down the mountain fast.
Q 03Tourists who come to believe they are figures from the Bible are said to have which city's syndrome?
- AJericho
- BJerusalem
- CNazareth
- DRome
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Jerusalem
Jerusalem. Israeli psychiatrists describe some sufferers making white, toga-like gowns, often from hotel bed linen, and preaching confused sermons at holy sites.
Q 04Which city's US diplomats recorded a 'sonic attack' that biologists matched to a cricket's call?
- AHavana
- BMoscow
- CBeijing
- DCaracas
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Havana
Havana, which named the syndrome. Echoing off indoor walls, the cricket's call matched almost perfectly, though a cricket can't explain the diplomats' symptoms.
Q 05Memorising London's streets to become a cab driver enlarges which part of the brain?
- AAmygdala
- BCerebellum
- CHippocampus
- DHypothalamus
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Hippocampus
The hippocampus, at its rear. Yet its front was smaller in cab drivers, and they did worse than bus drivers at redrawing a complex figure from memory.
Q 06A London asylum was nicknamed Bedlam, a slurred version of which town's name?
- ABethany
- BBethel
- CBedford
- DBethlehem
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Bethlehem
Bethlehem, from the Hospital of St Mary of Bethlehem. Until 1770 the public could visit at set times to see its patients, and poor boxes by the entrance collected donations.
Q 07Standing on the Acropolis, which famous thinker felt a strange sense of unreality, and later analysed it?
- ACarl Jung
- BSigmund Freud
- CFriedrich Nietzsche
- DAlbert Einstein
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Sigmund Freud
Sigmund Freud, on a 1904 visit. He only wrote about it 32 years later, in an essay titled 'A Disturbance of Memory on the Acropolis'.
Q 08Which French novelist, whose heart pounded among Florence's art, lends his pen name to a syndrome?
- AVoltaire
- BPierre Loti
- CStendhal
- DAnatole France
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Stendhal
Stendhal, a pen name Marie-Henri Beyle borrowed from the German town of Stendal. A Florence hospital regularly sees tourists dizzied by the city's art.
Q 09Which Santa Cruz attraction's tilted cabin makes balls seem to roll uphill?
- AThe Oregon Vortex
- BThe Winchester Mystery House
- CThe Mystery Spot
- DThe Magic Castle
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The Mystery Spot
The Mystery Spot. Berkeley psychologists found its cabin is tilted about 20 degrees, which fools your brain about which way is up.
Q 10Psychologists mapped where volunteers felt ghostly sensations inside which reputedly haunted Tudor palace?
- ABuckingham Palace
- BHampton Court Palace
- CKensington Palace
- DBlenheim Palace
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Hampton Court Palace
Hampton Court Palace. The eerie spots tracked shifting magnetic fields, hinting that ordinary surroundings, not ghosts, may lie behind the sensations.
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