How do trauma induced hallucinations manifest in the mind? And how/why does our sight allow elaborate hallucinations to betray reality like this?

212 views

To elaborate, why does our sight project these hallucinations even without visual impairment? It’s bizarre to me how one’s version of reality can be distorted like that and the body reacts to how disturbed the individual’s mind is.

In: 3

2 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

When the traumatic experience is stored in your memory your brain stores more of the emotional and perceptional experience than it stores of the context. (E.g. fear and pain over what you were doing before)

The traumatic memory can get recalled at a later date. Since the context isnt stored, the person suddenly experiences mostly the emotions and perceptional experience again. Most of the context isnt stored, so cant be retrieved.

This can at times be called a hallucination. The person experiences the memory as if it is happening at this moment.

As for the second part of your question. Your sight doesnt allow anything. The brain perceives the hallucination which makes it reality for the person. It can be triggered by certain things and isnt voluntary.

For the curious 5+ yo

Ive only learned about hallucinations and trauma when related to psychoses, so im not sure whether non-psychotic people are able to have true hallucinations with trauma. But when psychotic, people might sooner experience the reliving of their trauma as being a thing that is actually happening right now.

You are viewing 1 out of 2 answers, click here to view all answers.