Differences between Trance Channeling and Multiple Personality Disorder on Structured Interview

Trance channeling and multiple personality disorder both seem to be predicated on the basic mental process of dissociation. Dissociation has been defined, very simply, as the opposite of association. Elements of the psyche may be in a dynamic relationship with each other, in which case thoughts, feelings, experiences, etc. are integrated into consciousness and memory (association). Or these same elements of the psyche may be relatively isolated and separate, in which case they are dissociated (Ross, 1989, p. 87). This concept can be traced to Janet (1977). While dissociation in and of itself is a "normal human ability" (Richards, 1990), it is generally accepted that there is a continuum of dissociative phenomena (Bernstein & Putnam, 1986). Bernstein and Putnam have characterized this continuum as ranging "from the minor dissociations of everyday life to major forms of psychopathology such as multiple personality disorder" (1986, p. 728), while Richards (1990) has characterized it as ranging from automatizations of routine behaviors at one end to "co-consciousness" at the other. While Prince defined "co-consciousness" as simply the simultaneous but separate presence of two streams of consciousness (1978), Richards utilizes Beahrs' definition, Le, "the existence within a single human organism of more than one consciously experiencing psychological entity, each with some sense of its own identity or selfhood, relatively separate and discrete from other similar entities" (1982, p, 182). Phenomena at the far end of the dissociative continuum are the focus of this paper.