Different Concepts of Dissociation
Dissociation as unusual nonconsciousness, nonintegration, or inconsistency of mental processes
NONCONSCIOUSNESS: unusually absent conscious awareness of either impinging stimuli (as in hypnotically suggested negative hallucination) or ongoing behaviors (as in sleepwalking)
NONINTEGRATION: nonintegration of mental processes that should be integrated in the person’s consciousness, memory (as in dissociative amnesia, dissociative fugue), or identity (as is chronic in Dissociative Identity Disorder)
INCONSISTENCY: inconsistency of ongoing behavior or perception with a person’s sincere introspective verbal report; from the third person perspective, potentially indistinguishable in some cases from being repression (of memories, emotions, thoughts, impulses) or manifestation of a repressive coping style
Dissociation as altered consciousness: experiential disconnection/disengagement from the self or the environment
ABSORPTION: unusual absorption in fantasy or an imaginal scenario (which typically excludes from attention present bodily sensations or perceived features of the environment)
DEPERSONALISATION: experience of bodily sensations or perceptions of the environment as not belonging to one’s self, or experiencing the self as being removed or distant from the body
DEREALISATION: experience of one’s present environment or bodily sensations as being distant, dreamlike, or unreal in some way