Abstract
Objective: To identify the core issues contained within the dissociative disorders literature, and synthesize them into a non-polarized, inclusive perspective that emphasizes logic, core psychological principles and mutual professional respect.
Conclusions: A large percentage of all psychiatric patients are traumatized in clinically significant manners. Dissociation, in all its variants, represents a psychological mechanism for the victim of trauma to defend him/herself from being overwhelmed. Debates regarding the validity of dissociative disorders need to be viewed in the context of society's countertransference to trauma, in the context of health professionals feeling vulnerable to controversy, and in terms of their own experience of trauma.