To me Dan, the true determinant of your having the syndrome described is how you felt about your standardized test scores in high school, college and grad school. Did you feel like your achievement on thise (and I'll hold off on reporting those scores to the general public) were "a fluke"? Did you think just happened to have a good testing day? That's a pretty good clue as to your "imposterness" at the time you took that test. What's interesting is that over time, as your continued successes are internalized, your suffering has likely abated. After all, an intelligent person can only believe in luck and chance, etc for so long.

"I keep waiting to be dragged off by the Competence Police, but they're apparently no better at their job than I am at mine."

(Greg Knauss)

"She isn't a phony because she's a *real* phony."

- Truman Capote, Breakfast at Tiffany's

Oh, Jeez!

Another "syndrome" to make money for some author and then set up a whole slew of seminars to take advantage of people with Type A personalities (even that designation is hoaky.)

Successful people in professions, academia, and other high demand jobs have to be detail oriented, workaholic, and driven. The baggage with this is that you are unsure of what you have done and always looking for a better way to do it. Unless you have a narcissitic personality (a legitimate moniker) in which case you probably are not as critical and may really be a fraud.

On the other hand, who do you want handling your money, taking care of your health or even building your airplanes? Some one who is complacent and lazy or those people described above?

Its not a syndrome, it is simply mastering the Jedi Mind Trick!

You mean there are some 'academics' that realize most of what passes for 'higher education' these days is simple credential mongering?

Good for them!

Imagine how much a business would value a degree in say, 'gender studies' or 'cinema history' versus a degree in Mathematics, Physics or Chemistry.

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mikeyes wrote:

"academia, and other high demand jobs"

No doubt you are an 'educational professional'. What a load of horse manure you are peddling. Lecturing for 8 to 12 hours a week and havingTA/Graduate Assistants grade papers for $75,000-$125,000 a year is a 'high demand job'?

Try doing some real work: fire fighter, construction worker, chef, truck driver instead of flinging around crap like that.

Especially with what a 4 year degree costs these days. Increasing at twice the rate of inflation for decades. What a glorious scam! I think I'll become an 'academic professional' in my golden years. You, too, can be paid thousands of dollars a month for producing absolutely nothing at all.

anon,

Thanks for the compliments and the ad hominem evaluation.

For the record, I am not in academia, but my son is and he seems to work as hard as I do, which is at least 55 hours a week not counting on call over the weekends.

Besides, the demands I am talking about are of the Publish or Perish type that afflicts young non-tenured faculty in most research universities. Because of the glut of tenured professors these days, getting a decent job in academia requires a lot of work and a lot of stress. It takes a type A person to deal effectively with this kind of stress.

As for producing nothing at all, it seems that anon has managed to do so since he doesn't have his facts straight, or have any facts at all.

Anon,

I feel bitterness in you...perhaps because you couldn't get into this "scam"?

1. I have all eight symptoms and a couple of others, and it's killing me in grad school! (And I have a blog, too.)

2. Leonhardt's article about Schneider's study is extremely relevant to Bryan Caplan's new book _The Myth of the Rational Voter_.