Auditory verbal hallucinations (AVH: 'hearing voices') are found in both schizophrenia and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). In this paper we first demonstrate that AVH in these two diagnoses share a qualitatively similar phenomenology. We then show that the presence of AVH in schizophrenia is often associated with earlier exposure to traumatic/emotionally overwhelming events, as it is by...
At the Royal National Theatre Platform Performance with Tom Stoppard on 6 February 2015, host Nicholas Hytner, then still director of the RNT, started the conversation by quoting from a letter Stoppard had sent Hytner in 2013. In the letter, Stoppard indicates that he wanted to combine writing about the banking crisis and the possibility of a person’s altruistic goodness in the context of...
In the study of consciousness, neurophenomenology was originally established as a novel research program attempting to reconcile two apparently irreconcilable methodologies in psychology: qualitative and quantitative methods. Its potential relies on Francisco Varela's idea of reciprocal constraints, in which first-person accounts and neurophysiological data mutually inform each other. However,...
When read as a fictional psychosis narrative, Jesus' Son, a collection of short stories by Denis Johnson, reveals important elements of the phenomenology of schizophrenia and recovery. It is possible that Jesus' Son, as a work of fiction, may be able to uniquely add depth and nuance to an understanding of the phenomenology of schizophrenia involving a state of psychological fragmentation, an...
Two challenges that face popular self-monitoring theories (SMTs) of auditory verbal hallucination (AVH) are that they cannot account for the auditory phenomenology of AVHs and that they cannot account for their variety. In this paper I show that both challenges can be met by adopting a predictive processing framework (PPF), and by viewing AVHs as arising from abnormalities in predictive...
Promoting recovery has become more and more important in the care of patients with severe mental disorders such as psychosis. Recovery is a personal process of growth involving hope, self-identity, meaning in life, and responsibility. Obviously, these components pertain, at least in part, to a psychotherapeutic care perspective. Yet, up to now, recovery has mainly been taken into account in...
Investigation of synesthesia phenomenology in adults is needed to constrain accounts of developmental trajectories of this trait. We report an extended phenomenological investigation of sequence-space synesthesia in a single case (AB). We used the Elicitation Interview (EI) method to facilitate repeated exploration of AB's synesthetic experience. During an EI the subject's attention is...
Causal realism is the view that causation is a structural feature of reality; a power inherent in the world to produce effects, independently of the existence of minds or observers. This article suggests that certain problems in the philosophy of mind are artefacts of causal realism; because they presuppose the existence or possibility of a real causal nexus between the ‘physical’ and the...
Despite the recent proliferation of scientific, clinical, and narrative accounts of auditory verbal hallucinations (AVHs), the phenomenology of voice hearing remains opaque and undertheorized. In this article, we outline an interdisciplinary approach to understanding hallucinatory experiences which seeks to demonstrate the value of the humanities and social sciences to advancing knowledge in...
Typically reported as vivid, multisensory experiences which may spontaneously resolve, hallucinations are present at high rates during childhood. The risk of associated psychopathology is a major cause of concern. On the one hand, the risk of developing further delusional ideation has been shown to be reduced by better theory of mind skills. On the other hand, ideas of reference, passivity...