Failing to recognize one's mirror image can signal an abnormality in one's sense of self. In dissociative identity disorder (DID), individuals often report that their mirror image can feel unfamiliar or distorted. They also experience some of their own thoughts, emotions, and bodily sensations as if they are nonautobiographical and sometimes as if instead, they belong to someone else. To assess these experiences, we designed a novel backwards masking paradigm in which participants were covertly shown their own face, masked by a stranger's face. Participants rated feelings of familiarity associated with the strangers' faces. 21 control participants without traumagenerated dissociation rated masks, which were covertly preceded by their own face, as more familiar compared to masks preceded by a stranger's face. In contrast, across two samples, 28 individuals with DID and similar clinical presentations (DSM-IV Dissociative Disorder Not Otherwise Specified type 1) did not show increased familiarity ratings to their own masked face. However, their familiarity ratings interacted with self-reported identity state integration. Individuals with higher levels of identity state integration had response patterns similar to control participants. These data provide empirical evidence of aberrant self-referential processing in DID/ DDNOS and suggest this is restored with identity state integration.
This article presents a careerography of John F. Kennedy Jr. (JFK Jr.), a late 20th-century iconic personality. Careerography adapts psychobiography by anchoring its interpretive lens in established theories of career development. In our longitudinal case study of JFK Jr., the theories of Donald Super and Mary Sue Richardson served as the career theories to frame and interpret his career development. The sequential model of careerography applied to JFK Jr. focused on (1) our selection of the historical subject, (2) ethical considerations and bracketing, (3) outlining initial research questions, (4) choosing anchoring career theories, (5) engaging the iterative research and theory application process, and (6) writing the careerography. The article concludes with a brief discussion of how careerography adds to the historical study of notable personalities, and how in turn career theory can be informed through the intensive case study method of careerography.
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