"Fantasy prone personality (FPP) is a disposition or personality trait in which a person experiences a lifelong extensive and deep involvement in fantasy. This disposition is an attempt, at least in part, to better describe the popular term 'overactive imagination', or 'living in a dream world'. An individual with this trait (termed a fantasizer) may have difficulty differentiating between fantasy and reality and may experience hallucinations, as well as self-suggested psychosomatic symptoms. Closely related psychological constructs include daydreaming, absorption and eidetic memory." [1]
- Excellent hypnotic subject (most but not all fantasizers)
- Having imaginary friends in childhood
- Fantasizing often as child
- Having an actual fantasy identity
- Experiencing imagined sensations as real
- Having vivid sensory perceptions
- Reputed paranormal experiences (claiming psychic powers, encountering apparitions, reliving past experiences, having out-of-body experiences, communicating with higher intelligences or spirits, claiming to be abducted by aliens)
- Believe they have powers for spiritual healing or faith healing
- Hypnogogic hallucinations (waking dreams)
- Receiving sexual satisfaction without physical stimulation.
- Parents or carers who provided a very structured and imaginative mental or play environment during childhood.
- Exposure to abuse, physical or sexual, such that fantasizing provides a coping or escape mechanism
- Exposure to severe loneliness and isolation, such that fantasizing provides a coping or escape mechanism from the boredom.
Dangers
"The fantasy prone personality is typically discussed in a negative way. It’s used to shrug off people who believe in the supernatural, categorising their experiences as ridiculous because they’re prone to fantasise. The same accusation is sometimes hurled at people who uncover repressed memories of sexual abuse. For people who feel uncomfortable with the irrational, the fantasy prone personality has become something of a scapegoat." [2]
People with FPP can have stages of not being able to tell the difference between what is real and what is fantasy, this can range from mild to severe cases. People also tend to label others that may have FPP as weirdos or strange because it's hard for them to cling onto reality as fantasy life is a thousand times better. Of course when the confusion gets to a point of disturbing and making daily life dysfunctional then it's time to start looking into a treatment for it.
Benefits
"Being fantasy prone has benefits too. Goleman refers to studies done in the late 1980s that show “extreme fantasizers … are more creative and more empathetic than other people.” I think this has to do with the level of absorption we can muster. It’s like we’re transported into this alternate world where stuff happens: love, conflicts, journeys, triumphs. We don’t just watch it on a screen; we’re participants in it, and our bodies react emotionally as if it were all happening in real life." [2]
Researchers have found that FPP tends to help balance emotions; with the person being able to take out any negative and positive feelings out in their daydreams. Some say they cleanse them of extreme emotions as they can use them in any imaginative situation they would like, thus stopping them from overtaking their waking lives. Also researchers have discussed that the fantasies are useful to help the person find themselves, even if the fantasies are completely out there they have realistic goals at their roots.
[1] - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fantasy_prone_personality
[2] - http://rainbowgryphon.wordpress.com/2011/02/22/fantasy-prone-personality-benefits-dangers/
[1] - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fantasy_prone_personality
[2] - http://rainbowgryphon.wordpress.com/2011/02/22/fantasy-prone-personality-benefits-dangers/
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