Split-personality book 'Sybil' was hoax to make money

**bb1** Sun Oct 23, 2011 11:30 am

http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/279068/Psychiatry-best-seller-proved-fake

PSYCHIATRY BEST SELLER PROVED FAKE

Split-personality book 'Sybil' was hoax to make money 279068_1

Split-personality book 'Sybil' was hoax to make money 279068_1

Sybil is on the syllabus in scores of US schools and colleges

Sunday October 23,2011
By Mike Parker in los angeles
Have your say(0)

SYBIL, the shocking book that became an instant global phenomenon, has been exposed as a hoax 38 years on.
It tells the “true story” of a deeply disturbed woman with 16 personalities.
Seven million copies sold in the first year in America alone and it spawned a terrifying, Emmy-winning television series starring Sally Field and Joanna Woodward in 1976.
The 1973 book also paved the way for Multiple Personality Disorder to become an officially recognised psychiatric diagnosis. By the turn of the decade a handful of cases had rocketed to 40,000 in the US and Europe.
Sybil is on the syllabus in scores of US schools and colleges. Now it is revealed as a fraud by three women, all dead, who admitted in letters that they created the character for “fun, fame and profit”.
Author Debbie Nathan’s new book is called Sybil Exposed: The Extraordinary Story Behind the Famous Multiple Personality Case.

Ms Nathan discovered the proof in letters archived at New York University. The subject of Sybil was in fact Shirley Mason, a student in New York. She was thought to have been molested by a cousin and had a germ phobia. Therapist Cornelia “Connie” Wilbur began treating her and got her hooked on drugs including a “truth serum”. While “under”, Shirley claimed she became Peggy Lou, Peggy Ann and Vicky during blackouts.
Writes Ms Nathan: “Connie was fascinated and asked Shirley: ‘Would you like to make some money?’ The answer was yes… and Sybil was born.”
The book was written by Flora Schreiber who gave Shirley the pseudonym Sybil. The three fantasists coined a fortune, with Wilbur winning awards for her contribution to psychiatry, and spawned the “repressed-memory” industry. Shirley wrote in a letter to Connie: “I do not have any multiple personalities. I do not even have a double. I have essentially been lying. But it was quite thrilling and got me a lot of attention."

--------------------------------------------

And more cod-science bites the dust.

**Sabot** Sun Oct 23, 2011 11:37 am

And another load of damage that has done. Fake memories have ripped families apart.

Split-personality book 'Sybil' was hoax to make money

Split-personality book 'Sybil' was hoax to make money

Re: Split-personality book 'Sybil' was hoax to make money