On Dissociative Identity Disorder and Maladaptive Daydreaming

Abstract

A commentary on Ross, C. A. (2018). The potential relevance of maladaptive daydreaming in treatment of dissociative identity disorder in persons with ritual abuse and complex inner worlds. Frontiers in the Psychotherapy of Trauma and Dissociation, 2(1), 160-173. This is a commentary on In a recent paper by Ross (2018) compared maladaptive daydreaming (MD) and dissociative identity disorder (DID) and argued that there may be an overlap between some cases of MD and DID, particularly those with poly-fragmentation and complex inner landscapes. In this paper I argue that the capacity for absorptive daydreaming could be the psychological infrastructure that may lead, under specific circumstances, to the development of complex inner worlds, such as those observed in maladaptive daydreaming and dissociative identity disorder.