What is known about Walter Mitty types?
Hi Bryan… As noted in the blog of Richard G. Petty, MD, in discussing the Walter Mitty Syndrome (an unofficial designation): “Nobody has yet added the syndrome to the canon of psychological lore, yet every clinician has seen cases, and the syndrome is sometimes used as a pejorative term, particualrly in the political arena.” http://richardgpettymd.blogs.com/my_weblog/2006/10/walter_mitty_sy.html So there is no specific diagnosis which effectively labels this tendency to lie to accrue respect or an air of importance, mystery, or value in general. There are, however, some conditions where it is seen and more specifically diagnosed. A true diagnosis, you see, is never based on a single symptom or characteristic, but is based on being able to observe several specific symptoms or characteristics aggregated together. Myo touched on one of them: Münchhausen’s Syndrome describes a person who presents to medical professionals with highly exaggerated and emergent, made-up symptoms, with a payo
