Psychiatry

Symptoms, signs and split personality test

Modern man is subjected to a huge amount of stress, experiencing strong emotional experiences that can not but affect his psyche.

That is why the emergence of various kinds mental disorders today is a real problem.

These violations include split personality, symptoms and signs which manifest themselves in the form of the emergence of a second personality in the mind of man.

However, in each case, this violation manifests itself in different ways. For example, some people second person occurs only in moments of strong psycho-emotional experiences and stressful situations.

Alter is the (second person) of other patients manifested much more often, even if the person is at rest.

Does a split personality happen?

Despite the fact that a split personality, manifested in full, is extremely rare pathology Yet this problem has a place to be.

However, in most patients only individual symptoms of the disease are observed, and their combination is much less common.

Explanation of the term

Split personality carries a scientific name dissociative identity disorder. What does it mean?

The term "split personality" refers to the phenomenon of dissociative mental disorder.

The personality of the person is formed over the years, the process of its formation is influenced by various factors, such as social environment and environment, the knowledge and experience gained, the presence of stressful situations.

However, it is important to understand that in any person, even if he is psychologically healthy, at the same time there are several personalities. This explains the contradictory thoughts and desires inherent in a particular individual.

In the normal state, all these individuals are under the control of consciousness, the person is independently able to suppress them. However, in some cases alternative individuals out of control, which leads to dramatic and significant changes in behavior, mindset, and human consciousness.

Such the symptoms It is considered to be signs of a split personality - a pathological condition in which there are 2 or more personalities inside one human individual.

Causes of development

Symptoms of multiple personality splitting can cause various adverse factors. The most frequent cause is severe stress, emotional shock, which has a significant impact on the human psyche.

The appearance of an alternative person in this case can act as a defensive reaction when a person tries to convince himself that in fact nothing bad has happened to him.

As a result, negative memories may fade, and this is how a second person is formed, who believes that no stressful situation actually happened to her.

This is an alternative person. can appear very confident and intense, gradually crowding out the consciousness of the truth of the human person. In this case, the patient has serious mental problems, rapidly changing behavior, worldview, character.

Other negative factors contributing to the problem include:

  1. Long emotional overstrain. A person subject to frequent feelings and stresses (for example, workaholics who devote almost all their time to work) is more likely to suffer from this ailment.
  2. Character traits (in particular, people who are too mild in nature, differing in self-doubt). Such people do not want to make serious decisions, be afraid to bear responsibility for their actions, they do not know how to plan their future life. All this causes a person emotional distress, and the second person, acting as a stronger and more powerful one, is a defensive reaction of the patient.
  3. Addiction to computer games. Excessive enthusiasm for video games leads to the separation of a person from reality, as a result of which he forms an alternative personality, which is associated with a game character endowed with abilities that a person does not have in the real world. As a result, the patient perceives himself as a kind of superhero living in the virtual world, which, of course, has nothing to do with the existing reality. This problem is typical mainly for adolescents who most often choose their computer games hobbies.
  4. Sects and various spiritual organizations. A person who has fallen under such influence loses his inherent personality, and in its place a new “I” appears, created by the leaders and leaders of these organizations.

Not so long ago it was believed that various mental illnesses, for example, schizophrenia, cause the development of a split personality.

Today, psychologists argue that this is not the case, since we are talking about completely different pathologies that manifest themselves in various ways and have dissimilar symptoms.

Symptoms and signs

In a person suffering from a split personality, the following characteristic features of this disease manifest themselves:

  1. Violation of logical thinking. The patient is not able to understand the causal relationship of their actions, can not fully assess the consequences that will result in one or another of his actions.
  2. Memory impairment The patient often has memory lapses, that is, memories of those events that occurred to him at that moment when the main person was an alternative person, as a rule, are absent.
  3. Sharp mood swings. People with a split personality extremely unstable in psycho-emotional terms. In particular, in a short period of time, a person from an extremely aggressive, active state can turn into a state of severe depression and apathy.
  4. Instability of behavior. The patient often commits acts that no one expects from him, and which would be inappropriate in a given situation.
  5. The loss of your own "I". A person perceives the surrounding reality as it is, then ceases to feel itself a part of it, it becomes, as it were, divorced from the external world.
  6. Oddities in conversation. Often the patient, speaking of himself, uses “we” instead of “I,” besides, a person often conducts a dialogue with himself, and the intonation of his voice may change, as if 2 interlocutors participate in the dialogue.

These symptoms can occur at any age, however, most often they occur in adolescents, because in the puberty period the mental state of the child is less stable;

Patient characteristic

A person with a split personality is very unbalancedHe misunderstands the surrounding reality and himself as part of it.

A patient has frequent bouts of aggression, when there is no visible reason for its appearance.

In addition, the patient has a sleep disorder, often there are strong migraines, hyperhidrosis, which also has a negative impact on his quality of life. Man possesses a very changeable character, the disease is characterized by sudden mood swings.

For example, a few minutes ago the patient could experience euphoria, which abruptly replaced tearfulness or apathy. At the same time, the person himself is not aware that he is sick.

It is important to remember that at the initial stage of development of a disease a person does not pose any danger to others, however, over time and as the disease progresses, if the patient is not given the necessary help, he may become socially dangerous. In this case, it will require isolation from society.

How to live with a split personality? Find out from this video:

Examples

Over the past century, only 163 cases of this problem have been identified. The most famous patients of psychiatrists are:

  1. William Stanley Milligan. In the body of this man, more than 20 individuals got along, each of whom was completely independent, distinct from the others. These alternative personalities manifested themselves at various points, but never contacted each other.
  2. Doris Fisher, who had 5 different personalities. One of them (Margarita) was the most active, and, settling into the consciousness of a woman, forced her to do various dirty tricks. The patient's treatment did not bring any special results until a medium was called to the girl who managed to expel all other personalities from her consciousness except her own. To date, a woman is considered perfectly healthy.
  3. Shirley Mason. In the mind of the girl, 4 individuals coexisted, which differed from each other in the level of intelligence, character, and state of health. The most aggressive of these was the person who called herself Sally. She forced the girl to do very strange things. In particular, being under the influence of this individual, Shirley could look at the night for a suburban bus, go far beyond the city, after which she had to go back in the night. The treatment was carried out using hypnosis, today Shirley is considered a mentally healthy person.

Video will tell about the most incredible and amazing cases of split personality:

Are there any differences from schizophrenia?

Of course, these 2 illnesses are different diseases with different clinical picture.

So, with the diagnosis of schizophrenia, the patient hears voices, sees unrealistic images.

Auditory or visual hallucinations with a split personality not visible.

That is, the surrounding world changes in the mind of a patient with schizophrenia, and when the personality is split in two, an alternative “I” arises in the patient, and both individuals may have different age, gender, and character.

Split personality or schizophrenia? Watch the video:

Treatment methods

How to treat it? Combined therapy will help eliminate the manifestations of the problem, which includes taking certain medications as well as the use of psychotherapy methods. Of the medications the patient is most often prescribed reception:

  • antipsychotics;
  • antidepressants;
  • tranquilizers;
  • nootropics;
  • Vitamin preparations containing Vit. In and nicotinic acid.

It is important to remember that it is necessary to prescribe medication. with great care, as incorrectly chosen drug therapy can only aggravate the patient's condition.

Psychotherapeutic treatment is one of the important moments in the treatment of illness.

In particular, they use such methods of psychotherapy as:

  1. Self-analysis. It works only if the patient himself is aware of his illness. And this happens very rarely.
  2. Abstraction. A person selects only those thoughts and preferences that are characteristic of his real personality, while all other images must be blocked.
  3. Self affirmation. A person tries to accept all the features of his character, his preferences.
  4. Family trainings under the guidance of an experienced specialist.
  5. Hypnosis - the state of trance in which the blockage of pseudo-images occurs, the splitting of consciousness is eliminated.

Is it possible to consciously develop at home?

How to consciously get a person's dissociation at home? Theoretically, this is possible. Since it is believed that the main cause of the development of dissociative identity disorder is severe stress for the emergence of an alternative personality, it is necessary to consciously expose oneself to such experiences.

However, no one can predict what this second person will be, how she will manifest herself.

Tests

To understand that a patient develops this disease is not difficult, especially if his clinical manifestations are pronounced.

If the symptoms are of a blurred nature, special psychological tests will help identify problems, which are questionnaires that invite people to answer questions about their character, lifestyle, feelings and experiences.

Based on the data obtained, the doctor makes conclusions that the patient is healthy, he has there is a tendency to diseaseor it has already begun to manifest itself.

Split personality is a fairly rare dissociative mental disorder, in which two or more different personalities are formed in the patient's mind.

They may differ from each other in sex, age characteristics, behavior, intellectual development. Some of these imaginary personalities can be socially dangerous.

How to understand that you have a split personality? Go through test for multiple personality syndrome:

Watch the video: How to Test for Borderline Personality Disorder (May 2024).