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Annotated Bibliography

Is Dissociative Identity Disorder fact or fiction?

Eliza Deguzman

Professor Malcolm Campbell

English 1104

March 15, 2017

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Annotated Bibliography

Grohol, John M. What Is Dissociation? PsychCentral.com. 24 Feb. 2016,

psychcentral.com/library/dissociation_intro.htm. Accessed 15. Mar. 2017.

This is an article posted on a widely known website that provides medical information

from professionals on mental health, emotional support, and advocacy. In the article, the

author briefly explains the process of dissociating and how it could affect a patient. A

specific example, which is helpful for my research, is how patients with traumatic

experiences could trigger that person to dissociate their memory of place thus can result a

ripple on their sense of identity and history. That effect could possibly lead to multiple

personalities. The author also grazes against the controversial question: do people

actually have multiple personalities? Here, the author explains the technicality of

properly depicting a diagnosed patients alternate personalities. Though this source did

not specifically address my topic which is whether or not multiple personalities are fact

or fiction, it does provide great information that I can use to build up the beginning of my

research. I also deem this source trustworthy after seeing that it was written by a

professional and published by a website that is acknowledged by papers such as New

York Times or Los Angeles Times.

RN by Kallena for All In The Mind What Its like to Live with Dissociative Identity Disorder.

ABC News, 28 Feb. 2017, www.abc.net.au/news/2017-03-01/what-its-like-to-live-with-

dissociative-identity-disorder/8312076. Accessed 9 Mar. 2017.

This is an article posted on a news outlet for ABC in Australia. The article is a self-

reflection of a social worker named Kallena who is diagnosed with Dissociative Identity

Disorder. She gives us a brief background of her life surrounding the disorder, explaining
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how her abuse impacted her both physically and emotionally. She also explains her

journey with discovering the disorder, first being diagnosed as bipolar despite there being

signs of it being not. Reading through this article was very resourceful and it helped

reading it through a person who is actually diagnosed with the disorder rather than

reading information from medical experts. Its more personal and could be a great aid in

my research paper. I will use her account amongst others that I will find from books or

movies and use them support my argument on the topic. This sources comes from a

popular website and is sent by a person who only showed their first name and is not a

medical expert, but patients of the disorder come from various backgrounds which is

what makes my topic intriguing.

Slanzi, Crystal. Dissociative Identity Disorder: Drawing the Line between Fact and Fiction.

The Trauma and Mental Health Report, trauma.blog.yorku.ca. 13 Feb. 2013. Accessed 10

Mar. 2017.

This source is a blog post published on a blog site that is dedicated to topics about trauma

and mental health. Within this post we follow the author who is interviewing psychologist

and professor at Townson University, Bethany Brand and together they cover more in

depth about the controversy that surrounds the disorder, Dissociative Identity Disorder.

Brand explains how experts are able to distinguish when patients are bluffing or telling

the truth, stating that past childhood trauma should be present and that experts should not

suggest symptoms or history of trauma exposure. This can relate to my topic and provide

support to both sides of the argument. Brand is able to provide information that is backed

up through research. For example, if the fantasy model is more accurate and trauma is

fantasized, the relationship between dissociation and trauma are stronger when self-
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reported. Despite this being a blog post, bringing a medical expert into questioning

helped make the information more accurate. This blog post also is specific to my topic

and gave insight to both sides. I will use this information as background and support,

using the experiences shes had with clients and research that she has knowledge of.

Vissia, E. M., M. E. Giesan, S. Chalavi, E. R. S. Nijenhuis, N. Draijer, B. L. Brand, and A. A. T.

S. Reinders. Is it Trauma- or Fantasy-based? Comparing Dissociative Identity Disorder, Post-

Traumatic Stress Disorder, Simulators, and Controls. Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica, 25 May

2016. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/acps.12590/full. Accessed 10 Mar. 2017.

This is an academic journal entry that I found from the schools database. The entry

shows findings found from a study that compares two patients groups and two control

groups to examine whether the Trauma or Fantasy Model fits the best findings. This

relates to debunking some truth to the controversial question of whether the disorder is

fiction or fantasy based. The way they conducted this experiment is by taking females

between the ages 18 and 65 who were either officially diagnosed with DID, questioned to

have DID, or diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, and health controls. The

participants then went through variety of questionnaires where the conductors recorded

and later compared their findings. Their significant outcomes came out to be that with

patients with genuine diagnosed DID were not fantasy-prone and did not generate false

memories compared to other groups. Evidence also showed that findings supported the

Trauma Model more, thus challenging the Fantasy Model. This information is really

helpful supporting my side of the argument because I do believe that DID is a genuine

mental disease. This information may also aid me in coming up with potential

experiments that could be conducted in order to debunk more of the controversy.

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