Deja Experience by Travel Frequency

Logically, those individuals who travel should have more opportunities to experience a deja vu because they encounter objectively new physical locations more often than those who do not travel.

Several investigations support this speculation. Chapman and Mensh (1951) discovered that people who did not travel had an 11% incidence of deja vu, whereas those who made one to four trips a year had a 31% incidence, and people who took five or more trips per year had a 32% incidence of deja vu.

Richardson and Winokur (1967) found a similar relationship with both neurosurgery (11% incidence for nontravelers, 41% among those making one to four trips a year, and 44% for those taking five or more trips per year) and psychiatric patients (33% for nontravelers, 48% among those making one to four trips, and 45% for those taking five or more trips per year).

Thus, those who travel have more deja vu experiences than those who do not, but the amount of travel seems to make little difference. This association of deja vu with travel is probably interrelated with educational and socioeconomic differences, in that those in the upper class and with more education are more likely to travel.