Mental Illness as Self-Deception

“People who fake symptoms of mental illness can convince themselves that they genuinely have those symptoms, a new study suggests.” Scientific American on the power of the mind: “People will also adopt and justify signs of illness that they never reported themselves when presented with manipulated answers, according to the study published online July 9 in the Journal of Clinical and Experimental Neuropsychology. Not only do the findings demonstrate that deliberately feigning illness can evolve into an unconscious embellishment of symptoms, they indicate that self-perception of mental health is susceptible to suggestion. The study has particularly serious implications for cases in which people fake mental illness to take advantage of the legal system.”