This issue honors Stan Krippner and two other pioneers in consciousness studies, Jeanne Achterberg and Ruth-Inge Heinze. Achterberg was a key figure in mind/body medicine, especially the role of imagery in healing. Heinze dedicated herself to the interdisciplinary study of shamanism. Krippner, described as a quintessential liminal figure, made major contributions to research on dreams, anomalous cognition, personal mythology, and other areas of consciousness. The text is a tribute and editorial framing, not an empirical study.
People who have distressing near-death experiences (NDEs) often report disturbing feelings, darkness, and frightening images, and afterward face emotional and social difficulties, including negative reactions when they share their experience and heightened emotions. Some distressing NDEs also include positive features, making them hybrid experiences. Future research should focus on these hybrid cases and use mixed methods and more qualitative approaches.
The authors propose revisions to the diagnostic criteria for Dissociative Disorders in DSM-5 based on a review of clinical, phenomenological, epidemiological, cultural, and neurobiological data. They recommend that Depersonalization Disorder include derealization symptoms, that Dissociative Fugue become a subtype of Dissociative Amnesia, and that the criteria for Dissociative Identity Disorder emphasize disruptive dissociation and amnesia for everyday as well as traumatic events, with possession experiences included in identity disruption. They also suggest placing Dissociative Trance Disorder in the Unspecified Dissociative Disorder category.