General Conclusions

Abstract

This work has developed a new model of daydreaming and fantasy immersion. Constructing the model has required identifying problems in existing theories of daydreaming and reinterpreting available ideas. Literature critically appraised and synthesised includes the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorder, fourth edition (DSM-IV); Wilson and Barber’s original conception of fantasy proneness (Wilson & Barber, 1981, 1983); Winnicott’s theory of transitional phenomena and objects; the related controversy of fetish construction in childhood (Wulff, 1946; Winnicott, 1953, 1971; Sperling, 1963) and Stoller’s theory of perversion (Stoller, 1975). Major studies have comprised empirical research of fan mail sent to a Hollywood celebrity and the exploration of a genre of American pulp fiction known as Weird Menace. Summarising the model and its relation to existing concepts across the work demonstrates the advantages of the developed understanding of waking fantasy.