The classification of delusional misidentification syndromes

Area of Science:

• Neuroscience
• Psychiatry
• Cognitive Science

Background:

• Delusional misidentification syndromes (DMS) are characterized by beliefs in duplicates and replacements.
• These syndromes manifest across multiple domains, including person, place, time, objects, body parts, and the self.

Purpose of the Study:

• To classify and describe the features of delusional misidentification syndromes.
• To propose a neural basis for these syndromes.

Main Methods:

• Review and classification of DMS based on phenomenological characteristics.
• Hypothesized neural mechanisms involving altered brain connectivity.

Main Results:

• DMS can be categorized by the modality of reduplication (person, place, object, etc.).
• Key features include selectivity, co-occurrence of forms, intact recognition with faulty identification, depersonalization, and symbolic representation.
• A neural substrate involving altered connectivity in multimodal association areas and limbic structures is proposed.

Conclusions:

• Delusional misidentification syndromes represent a spectrum of reduplication phenomena.
• Altered connectivity leading to cognitive-perceptual-affective dissonance is suggested as the underlying neural mechanism.