From: CurtAdams@aol.com
Date: Mon Nov 04 1996 - 17:04:21 MST
chind@juno.com (Chris Hind) writes:
>But true mp disorder results from a childhood trauma so
>the disorder isn't particularly normal.
Right. Multiple personality "disorder" is a very different state from the
"society of mind" multiple personalities some people have talked about here.
I'm not aware of a precise delineation of the difference between normal
multifacted personality and pathological multiple personality. I believe the
original question was about the ability of multiple personalities to access
each other's memories. That, at least, would be one candidate for
distinction; normal people have access to all the memories of all their
personalities, subject to the numerous known imperfections of human memory.
Multiple personalities have complex shared memories; each personality can
access the memories of some but not all other personalities. Often memories
are shared mostly in a parentage-type situation; each personality emerges as
a defense mechanism of some other personality (its parent). Each personality
can generally access the memories of its parent and ancestors but cannot
access the memories of its children. Its ability to access memories on other
lines of descent varies. The "original" personality, being the one that
starts the whole process, usually can access only its own memories. There is
usually one personality which can access any memory, but I don't recall any
such for "Eve".
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