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Schizophrenia is not a Split Personality Disorder


Schizophrenia is not a split personality disorder despite the plethora of erroneous popular culture– and even academic –references to it being such. Dissociative Identity Disorder is the proper classification.

The confusion typically stems from misinterpreting schizophrenia as it often translates to “split brain,” i.e. the schizophrenic’s connections between the left and right hemispheres of their brain are faulty resulting in distorted thinking, delusions, hallucinations, etc. It has nothing to do with personality.

Here’s an example of the term schizophrenic being misused by a politician:


This ↑↑↑↑ is not schizophrenia.

Sources:

National Institute of Mental Health. 2009. “What is schizophrenia?”. http://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/publications/schizophrenia/index.shtml

Todd, Juanita, Lisa Whitson, Ellen Smith, Patricia T. Michie, Ulrich Schall, and Philip B. Ward. 2014. “What’s intact and what’s not within the mismatch negativity system in schizophrenia.” Psychophysiology 51, no. 4: 337-347.