BIID

Understanding body integrity identity disorder

Ana Pelaez Acevedo

Introduction

Body Integrity Identity Disorder (BIID) is not a typical psychological issue. People with this disorder desire to amputate limbs since they feel disconnected from these parts. Since this disorder is rare, there are few studies on information on body integrity identity disorder. These two studies determine what this disorder is and where it stems from.

"Body Integrity Identity Disorder, 2012"

• Researchers stated that this issue is “not a paraphilia nor does the desire to amputate the limb reflect psychosis amputation. Rather, it is believed that BIID is an identity disorder” (Blom et al., 2012).

• It is strongly believed that the desire to amputate comes from actual and perceived body schema.

• Somatoparaphrenia is a syndrome where a cerebral tumor or stroke causes damage in the parietal lobe.

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Methods

• Since there are subtypes of BIID (what part they want to be amputated/paralyzed), researchers evaluated all data.
• It compared BIID people with/without amputation on how it affected work, social, and family life.

• 54 BIID individuals were studied with a detailed questionnaire on somatic, psychiatric, and BIID characteristic data.
• The BIID Phenomenology Questionnaire consisted of 6 parts (112 questions, usually multiple-choice, with space for additional comments or options.)

They found that BIID is prevalent in early childhood, with 80%of their subjects being men. They concluded that BIID’s “desire for body modification is to feel complete or to feel satisfied inside, sexual motives are often secondary” (Blom et al., 2012).

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Results for Study 1

“Neural Basis of Limb Ownership in Individuals with Body Integrity Identity Disorder, 2013"

• Studies how people with this disorder feel alienated from their body parts.

• “However, they do not suffer from delusions or psychosis and fully understand the bizarre nature of their wish. BIID is associated with significant functional impairment, but there is currently no effective pharmacological or psychotherapeutic treatment option" (van Dijk et al., 2013).

• Since the feeling of body ownership stems from the frontoparietal network, people with BIID are known to have parietal lobe damage tend to have problems having ownership of their bodies.

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The researchers concluded that there was heightened sensitivity in the somatosensorynetwork compared to tactile to the control. It suggests that hypofunction in the PM is associated with the feeling of disownership of the amputated limb, indicating that the PM is involved in body ownership showed a high response no matter what leg it was. The PM was the only part of the brain that was constantly changing in either the stimulation of the alienated leg or the accepted one, making it the one involved in body ownership. "damage to the premotor cortex has been associatedwith the lack of awareness of a limb (asomatognosia) in a case report” (Van Dijik et al., 2013), which proves how both studies have to do with the frontoparietal network.

Putting it together

The result of these combined articles is that body integrity identity disorder is a rare disorder that still has yet to be explained. BIID needs to be recognized as a neural issue to help develop a proper treatment for people with it.

Future Research

There needs to be more studies to develop an effective treatment for people with this disorder. There needs to be more research on this subject since it is still unclear where the desire for amputation and paralyzation comes from, even if there is now proof that ownership relies on the PM. More studies on a neural basis should be done to see if the results concluded with different body parts.

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