Definition.
A dissociative disorder diagnostic category of conditions characterized by maladaptive divisions between parts of the psyche. Because of these divisions, a person may experience lapses in recall, changes in sense of identity, or diminished access to knowledge. Those ‘disorders’ commonly understood as dissociative include: dissociative identity disorder (DID), depersonalization/derealization disorder, dissociative amnesia, other specified dissociative disorder (such as dissociative trance), and the ‘kitchen sink’ diagnosis, unspecified dissociative disorder.
That said, dissociation likely has a role in maladies beyond those conventionally understood as dissociative disorders. For instance,
Jung suggested that psychotic individuals may be under the spell of an insuperable complex;
footnote 1
complexes are, themselves, an expression of dissociative processes.
Meanwhile, some migraine headaches might be understood as a bodily expression of dissociated emotions.
Additionally, I propose that it may be fitting to avoid the term dissociative ‘disorder’ altogether. Dissociation may, in fact, be understood as
psyche’s attempt to create a homestasis in a variety of conditions, including but not limited traumas. For this reason, I prefer simply the term
dissociative identity
rather than dissociative identity disorder.
Other phrasings might be, dissociative identity response
or dissociative identity adaptation.