Schneiderian First Rank Symptoms

Hi everyone,

Can anyone tell me what "made actions / thoughts / feelings" are?
I think I experience this but I'm just not sure.

Thanks, Zel.

"8. "Made" Feeling
The patient has the experience that his feelings are not his own, they have been imposed upon him.
9. Made" Impulses
The patient experiences and generally acts upon a compelling impulse which he believes is not his own.
10. "Made" Acts
The patient experiences his action and his will to be under the control of an outside force."
From here: https://www.msu.edu/user/barberio/schizol1.htm

I do have to add something...

The thing is, internal versus external, matters. If you have DID, and feel like someone inside of you is making you think/feel/do something, that likely just means your alters are affecting you. That's very common with DID. If you have something like schizophrenia, you might believe someone outside of you is controlling your thoughts/actions/feelings.

canolime wrote:The thing is, internal versus external, matters. If you have DID, and feel like someone inside of you is making you think/feel/do something, that likely just means your alters are affecting you. That's very common with DID. If you have something like schizophrenia, you might believe someone outside of you is controlling your thoughts/actions/feelings.

Thanks Canolime,
That's how I understood it . I do feel I have thoughts, feelings, actions that are driven by another part, but never from an "outside force".

I was just a bit confused by the scoring on the DDIS that seems to suggest that DID people score higher on these criteria than I would have thought based on my understanding above.

V. Positive Symptoms of Schizophrenia (Schneiderian First Rank Symptoms)

64. Have you ever experienced the following

Yes=1 No=2 Unsure=3

a) voices arguing in your head [ ]

b) voices commenting on your actions [ ]

c) having your feelings made or controlled by someone or something outside you [ ]

d) having your thoughts made or controlled by someone or something outside you [ ]

e) having your actions made or controlled by someone or something outside you [ ]

f) Influences from outside you playing on or affecting your body such as some external force or power. [ ]

g) having thoughts taken out of your mind [ ]

h) thinking thoughts which seemed to be someone else's [ ]

i) hearing your thoughts out loud [ ]

j) other people being able to hear your thoughts as if they're out loud [ ]

k) thoughts of a delusional nature that were very out of touch with reality [ ]


[color=#000000]I've coloured the answers that apply to me. I'm not sure about g) I guess I score 3. I'm surprised the average score was 6.5. (I think that's from a group of DID subjects.)

1. Schneiderian First Rank Symptoms
In this section we score the total number of "yes" responses. The total number of Schneiderian symptoms positive discriminates DID from all groups tested including schizophrenia. The average number of positive symptoms in 166 subjects was 6.5.
Best, Zel.

Canolime is absolutely correct, it is paramount to make a distinction between non-self influence that comes from inside your head (DID and DID-like DDNOS, acute PTSD, etc.) vs outside your head (schizophrenia). I guess many of the people writing these diagnostic questions don't quite grasp the distinction. I can endorse most of the first-rank symptoms if the phrase "outside you" means outside your self not outside your head.

I can endorse most of the first-rank symptoms if the phrase "outside you" means outside your self not outside your head.

Yes, exactly this!

One experienced therapist describes the subjective experience of "made" thoughts, feelings, and behaviors as follows:

Dissociative clients report a range of passive influence phenomena. I explore any report of feeling the body being controlled as if by an outside force. This frequently takes the form of feeling irritable, angry, or enraged without knowing why. Some clients speak of "blind anger" or "blind rage." One of my clients described a "seething" feeling that seemed to come out of nowhere. [...] It's helpful to ask, "Do you often find yourself having strong feelings that seem to come out of nowhere or urgent impulses to do something and you don't know why?" Lack of insight into the context of emotional responses does not necessarily reflect dissociation, of course. But adequate insight in other areas and confusion in this area warrants further exploration.

Source: Treating dissociative identity disorder: the power of the collective heart by Sarah Y. Krakauer.

Una+ wrote:I can endorse most of the first-rank symptoms if the phrase "outside you" means outside your self not outside your head.

Yes, me too. It's all in the wording...
I've just come across some conflicting things on the web.

Thanks, Zel.

Yes=1 No=2 Unsure=3

a) voices arguing in your head [1]

b) voices commenting on your actions [1]

c) having your feelings made or controlled by someone or something outside you [2]

d) having your thoughts made or controlled by someone or something outside you [2]

e) having your actions made or controlled by someone or something outside you [2]

f) Influences from outside you playing on or affecting your body such as some external force or power. [2]

g) having thoughts taken out of your mind [1]

h) thinking thoughts which seemed to be someone else's [1]

i) hearing your thoughts out loud [2]

j) other people being able to hear your thoughts as if they're out loud [2]

k) thoughts of a delusional nature that were very out of touch with reality [1]

1. Schneiderian First Rank Symptoms
In this section we score the total number of "yes" responses. The total number of Schneiderian symptoms positive discriminates DID from all groups tested including schizophrenia. The average number of positive symptoms in 166 subjects was 6.5.
Best, Zel.[/quote]
i got a 5..is that good?? lol

Okay, I'll play too.

a) voices arguing in your head [yes]
b) voices commenting on your actions [yes]
c) having your feelings made or controlled by someone or something outside you [yes]
d) having your thoughts made or controlled by someone or something outside you [yes]
e) having your actions made or controlled by someone or something outside you [yes]
f) Influences from outside you playing on or affecting your body such as some external force or power [no]
g) having thoughts taken out of your mind [yes]
h) thinking thoughts which seemed to be someone else's [yes]
i) hearing your thoughts out loud [no]
j) other people being able to hear your thoughts as if they're out loud [no]
k) thoughts of a delusional nature that were very out of touch with reality [unsure]

Number yes: 7. None of this happens very often for me, except the "made" feelings. They are present almost every day now, and on some days they are present all day long.

chibixal wrote:i got a 5..is that good??

I would say it is within normal limits for someone with DID.

In his article First-rank symptoms as a diagnostic clue to multiple personality disorder, Kluft (1987) reported that 30 patients with MPD (DID) had one or more of Schneider's 11 first rank symptoms at initial assessment (mean = 3.6; range = 1-8). [I wonder how many patients beyond these 30 had none of these symptoms?]

Ross et al (1990) reported that 102 MPD clients diagnosed in four centers acknowledged on average 6.4 first rank symptoms. Combining these 102 clients with two previously reported groups of clients, Ross et al reported an average of 4.9 first rank symptoms in 368 MPD clients, compared with an average of 1.3 symptoms acknowledged by 1,739 schizophrenics in 10 published series. Ross et al conclude that Schneiderian first rank symptoms are more characteristic of MPD than of schizophrenia.

PubMed Abstract: Kluft (1987)
PubMed Abstract: Ross et al (1990)