A dissociative disorder in which a person develops two or more distinct personalities often called subpersonalities, or alternate personalities, each with a unique set of memories, behaviors, thoughts, and emotions. This disorder is also known as Multiple Personality Disorder. At any time, one personality controls the person’s actions, while the others stay in the background. Usually, there is one sub personality, called the primary (or host) personality, which appears most often.

The change from one personality to another is called switching. Switching is usually sudden and dramatic, and it often happens after a stressful event. Most cases are diagnosed in late adolescence or early adulthood, but the problem often starts in early childhood, usually after trauma or abuse.

 

Interactions among Subpersonalities:

Subpersonalities in Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID) interact with each other in different ways. Generally, there are three kinds of relationships:

1) In mutually amnesic relationships, the subpersonalities have no awareness of one another.

2) In mutually cognizant patterns, All personalities are aware of each other. They may hear each other’s voices and talk to each other.

3) In one-way amnesic relationships, the most common relationship pattern, some subpersonalities are aware of others, but the awareness is not mutual.

Those who are aware, called “coconscious subpersonalities”. They are “quiet observers” who watch the actions and thoughts of the other subpersonalities but do not interact with them.

On average, women have about 15 personalities, and men have about 8. Some cases have shown over 100 personalities.

Subpersonalities and Their Differences

Subpersonalities in DID can be very different from each other. They often have:

✅ 1. Identifying Features

•          The subpersonalities may have differences in age, gender, race, and family history.

✅ 2. Abilities and Preferences

•          Different personalities can have different skills. One might drive, speak another language, or play an instrument, while others cannot. They may have different handwriting styles. They also have different likes (food, music, friends, books).

✅ 3. Physiological Responses

•          They may show physical differences like different blood pressure levels, different allergies, or even different brain activity.

 

EXPLAIN DISSOCIATIVE IDENTITY DISORDER

THE PSYCHODYNAMIC VIEW

Psychodynamic theorists believe dissociative disorders happen because of repression. Repression means pushing away painful memories, thoughts, or feelings into the unconscious mind so we don’t feel anxiety.

Everyone uses repression sometimes, but people with (DID) use it too much. It is seen as a lifetime of extreme repression. It is usually caused by traumatic childhood experiences.

THE BEHAVIORAL VIEW

Behaviorists believe that dissociation comes from normal memory processes, such as forgetting. They told it is learned through operant conditioning.

Forgetting trauma for a short time lowers anxiety, making the person more likely to forget again in the future. So, dissociation is seen as an escape behavior.

STATE-DEPENDENT LEARNING (COGNITIVE-BEHAVIORAL VIEW):

People with dissociative disorders often have very strong links between their memories and their emotional state. They can remember something only when they are in the same emotional or physical state as when the memory was formed. In dissociative identity disorder, different levels of arousal create different sets of memories, thoughts, and skills—basically different personalities. This explains why personality changes often happen suddenly during stress.

SELF-HYPNOSIS:

Self-hypnosis means hypnotizing yourself, sometimes to forget bad experiences. Some children who go through abuse or trauma escape by using self-hypnosis. They mentally separate from reality and imagine becoming someone else, which can lead to the creation of subpersonalities.

TREATMENTS

People with dissociative identity disorder do not typically recover without treatment. Treatment for this is complex and difficult.

Therapists usually try to help the clients:

1.        Recognize fully the nature of their disorder.

2.        Recover the gaps in their memory by using psychodynamic therapy, hypnotherapy, and drug treatment.

3.        Integrate their subpersonalities into one functional personality.