Hallucinations are part of the symptomcomplex of many disease states, and have also been reported in so-called "normal" individuals.16,35 Most studies dealing with hallucinations consider the phenomenon only as a manifestation of a more basic underlying disorder. I feel it would be helpful in the understanding of hallucinatory phenomena to consider them from the standpoint of common factors in etiology and psychological meaning, and will attempt to elucidate a number of common denominators that may facilitate dealing with hallucinations as a concept, and as an intrinsically meaningful symptom, rather than as a nonspecific reaction of the organism to stress.
Much has been written on the general subject of hallucinations, but there is little in the literature concerning hallucinations in children per se. The significant studies that have appeared in the literature are by Bouchut,6 in 1886; Moreau,36 in 1888; Sherman and