Psychiatrist Colin Ross told BBC News that an estimated 2 to 4 percent of adults globally spend up to 12 hours a day immersed in vivid fantasies due to a condition called maladaptive daydreaming. When an individual finds their inner world more captivating than reality, it can severely disrupt daily functioning and transform into a powerful behavioral addiction. The recent report highlights that being trapped in an internal cinema is far more common than most medical professionals initially presumed.
Most people spend between 30 and 50 percent of their waking hours engaged in thoughts entirely unrelated to their immediate tasks. Regular daydreaming serves a positive purpose by helping individuals regulate emotions, build empathy, and foster natural creativity. However, maladaptive daydreaming completely absorbs a person, effectively isolating them from their actual physical life. Those affected by this specific condition can spend entire decades developing complex narratives and characters within their minds, eventually feeling a deep sense of shame over the precious time lost to their detailed fantasies.
Kyla Borcherds began creating alternate worlds in her head when she was just 4 years old. The habit intensified significantly after a move to a new school, where other children ruthlessly teased her regional accent. Her imaginary stories became a private safe haven where she felt accepted and entirely protected from ridicule. The compulsion to daydream became so overwhelming that she would spend consecutive hours pacing her driveway on roller skates just to maintain her intense concentration on the internal narratives. She admitted that the sudden urge felt as powerful as an addiction to sugar or modern social media.
Eli Somer, an emeritus clinical psychology professor at the University of Haifa in Israel, originally coined the specific term maladaptive daydreaming. Having researched the psychiatric condition for over 2 decades, he notes that the primary issue occurs when the fantasy begins to harness the person rather than the other way around. Around 80 percent of individuals dealing with this condition use unconscious physical gestures, such as pacing repeatedly or rocking, and actively listen to music to sustain their concentration while deeply immersed in their personal thoughts.
Wanda Fischera, clinical psychologist and research director at the International Society for Maladaptive Daydreaming, suggests that unmet emotional needs frequently drive this repetitive behavior. If someone feels lonely or inadequate in reality, their daydreams often cast them in a heroic or deeply loved role. What remains unclear is how the broader psychiatric community will officially categorize the condition in future diagnostic manuals, as formal clinical treatments are still actively evolving. The fantasies provide a temporary but potent escape from extreme social isolation.
Another affected individual, Maria, confessed to feeling profoundly lonely during her turbulent childhood. She would rock back and forth for hours while listening to music to successfully facilitate her elaborate daydreams. Her parents and school teachers completely misinterpreted her visible struggles as mere laziness or a stubborn refusal to study. Despite developing enough detailed storylines to easily fill 10 movie scripts over the years, Maria never documented any of them, leading to a heavy awareness of wasted potential and unrecoverable time.
Borcherds also noticed that her compulsive daydreaming actively held her back during the early stages of her professional career. She found herself lacking the basic motivation to seek workplace promotions because her imagination easily provided the same feeling of success without any actual physical effort. Studies show a remarkably strong connection between maladaptive daydreaming and severe childhood trauma. Individuals who have suffered emotional abuse often use these extensive fantasies to intentionally avoid processing painful past memories. Additionally, in a targeted study involving adults diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder, 43 percent reported experiencing maladaptive daydreaming as a direct coping mechanism.
