# A Dynamic Approach to Compulsive Fantasy: Constraints and Creativity in “Maladaptive Daydreaming”

## TL;DR

The paper explores how compulsive fantasy, known as maladaptive daydreaming, involves intense mental episodes that can disrupt daily life and are distinct from regular daydreaming.

## Contribution

The paper introduces a dynamic framework linking compulsive fantasy to thought constraints and distinguishes it from daydreaming.

## Key findings

- Compulsive fantasy episodes are driven by automatic constraints like affective salience and mental habits.
- Deliberate constraints intermittently influence the fantasy during an episode.
- Fantasy and daydreaming can become harmful when automatic constraints are strong and sustained.

## Abstract

Compulsive fantasy, often called “maladaptive daydreaming,” involves frequent engagement with immersive fantasies that can sometimes interfere with everyday life and cause distress. This paper expands on Christoff and colleagues’ Dynamic Framework of Thought (DFT) to offer a process-based analysis of compulsive fantasy as it relates to other mental phenomena such as daydreaming and creative thought. Drawing on the existing literature and posts on online forums by self-identified maladaptive daydreamers, we also propose an account of how compulsive fantasy episodes may unfold in terms of the oscillating dynamics of various constraints on thought, and how these dynamics may be related to a perceived struggle with agency. Automatic constraints, including affective salience and mental habits, may bring about a fantasy episode. During a fantasy episode, automatic constraints may be relatively high throughout, whereas deliberate constraints may be intermittently engaged to influence the fantasy. Our analysis supports the use of “compulsive fantasy” as a more accurate designation than “maladaptive daydreaming” for this phenomenon: compulsive fantasies are not daydreams, because they are more constrained in their mental dynamics. We show that fantasy and daydreaming are not inherently harmful but can become so when they are accompanied by relatively strong and sustained automatic constraints on thought.