False sensory perception without external stimuli is called?

Appeared in: AIIMS Rishikesh & Jodhpur NO - 2017

Explanation

A hallucination is defined as a sensory experience or perception that occurs without any external stimulus.
These perceptions feel very real to the person experiencing them.
Hallucinations can affect any of the five senses: auditory (hearing voices), visual (seeing things), tactile (feeling sensations on the skin), olfactory (smelling odors), and gustatory (tasting things).
This directly matches the question's description of a 'false sensory perception without external stimuli'.

Why Other Options Were Wrong

Option A: Dementia is not a single perceptual disturbance but a syndrome characterized by a chronic and progressive decline in multiple cognitive functions, including memory, language, and problem-solving.
Option B: A delusion is a disorder of thought content, not perception. It is a false, fixed belief that is firmly held despite evidence to the contrary.
Option C: An illusion is a misinterpretation or distortion of a real external stimulus. The key difference is that a stimulus is actually present, unlike in a hallucination.

Related Visual

A comparative chart with three columns. The first shows a person in an empty, quiet room hearing voices Hallucination. The second shows a person looking at a rope on the floor...

Clinical Relevance

Nursing practice connection: This is primarily an exam-oriented knowledge point with limited direct bedside application, so retain Definitions of perceptual and thought disorders as background academic context rather than a clinical decision trigger.
Assessing for hallucinations is a critical nursing responsibility, as they can be a symptom of serious psychiatric conditions like schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and severe depression, or medical conditions like delirium, substance withdrawal, and neurological diseases.
Patient safety is a primary concern. Auditory hallucinations might command the patient to harm themselves or others. Nurses must assess the content of hallucinations to mitigate any potential risk.
What if? If the question stated 'a misinterpretation of a real stimulus', the correct answer would change to 'Illusion'. This highlights the importance of clarifying whether any external stimulus is present when a patient reports an unusual perception.

How to Approach the Question

This is a definition-based recall question.
First, break down the question stem into key components: 1) 'False sensory perception' and 2) 'without external stimuli'.
Evaluate each option against these two components.
Dementia is a cognitive decline, not a single perceptual event. Eliminate it.
A delusion is a false belief (thought), not a sensory perception. Eliminate it.
An illusion is a false perception, but it's a misinterpretation of an existing stimulus. This contradicts 'without external stimuli'. Eliminate it.

Concept Tested & Keywords

Concept Tested: Definitions of perceptual and thought disorders
Stem keywords: False sensory perception, without external stimuli
Lead-in keywords: is called
Negative lead-in flag: false

Question ID

q4HUGAbvhkapQwBX3Hsj-

Reference Book

E6 Robert Boland, Marcia L. Verduin - Kaplan and Sadock's Comprehensive Text of Psychiatry-Wolters Kluwer Health (2024) (pp 1-16525 of 16525) pp. 3815-3817, 3250-3252

E6 Medicine Macleod Clinical Examination 15e p. 372-374

Practise the full AIIMS Rishikesh & Jodhpur NO - 2017

Attempt every question from this paper in a timed mock, then review the full solution for each one.

Attempt this paper Attempt in the NPrep app