Imposter feelings

With her first salary from the multinational in Gulshan, Sanjida, 29, bought her mother a jamdani saree. Her father, a retired schoolteacher in Mymensingh, has told the whole mosque. Her Nanu is less certain. “Multinational mane ki? An office in many countries at once? How do you get to all of them?” The family group fills with laughing faces.

At work, nobody is laughing at her, but she is sure they will. Her colleagues went to English-medium schools and talk about weekends in Bangkok. At a team lunch someone said, kindly, “Sanjida, your accent is so cute.” She reads every email five times before sending it. Her review last month said “exceeds expectations”, and she put it down to luck and a generous manager. To her school friend on the phone she says, “Any day now, they’ll find out I don’t belong here.”

An illustration drawn from common experience. The person is invented; the pattern is not.

Understanding imposter feelings

Imposter feelings, sometimes called imposter syndrome or the impostor phenomenon, are a lasting sense that your success is due to luck or to fooling people, with a fear of being found out, despite real evidence of ability. It is not a diagnosis in ICD-11 or DSM-5-TR. It is a pattern of thinking, and it often comes with overwork, perfectionism and difficulty accepting praise. A psychiatrist will also look for the conditions that commonly travel with it, especially anxiety disorders, including social anxiety, and depression.

How common it is

A systematic review of 62 studies with 14,161 participants found prevalence estimates ranging from 9% to 82%, depending largely on the questionnaire and cut-off used. Imposter feelings were particularly common among ethnic minority groups, occurred in both men and women and across ages from adolescence to late career, were often found together with depression and anxiety, and were associated with poorer job performance, lower job satisfaction and burnout.

Signs worth noticing

• Putting success down to luck, timing or other people’s kindness
• Over-preparing, or rewriting work many times before sending it
• Dreading praise, promotion or being noticed
• Comparing yourself constantly with colleagues
• Working longer hours than others to avoid being caught out
• Anxiety or low mood that has started to affect sleep or health

How care helps

The same review, which searched up to 2018, found no published studies that had tested treatments for imposter feelings themselves, so care focuses on what is underneath and around them. If there is an anxiety disorder or depression, it is assessed and treated in the usual way, often with CBT, and medication where guidelines support it. In therapy, people learn to notice the thoughts (“they only promoted me to fill a quota”), test them against evidence, drop some of the over-preparing that keeps the fear going, and talk openly with a mentor or peers, who often feel the same.

What getting better can look like

Sanjida’s version might be a folder called “evidence” with every piece of good feedback in it, emails sent after one careful read, and at the next team lunch, an unhurried story about Muktagacha monda that has the whole table asking her to bring some back.

Common questions about imposter feelings

Is imposter syndrome a mental illness?

No. Imposter syndrome is not a diagnosis in ICD-11 or DSM-5-TR; it describes a pattern of doubting your achievements and fearing exposure. It is common, and a systematic review found it often occurs alongside anxiety and depression, which are treatable conditions. If the feelings are affecting your sleep, health or work, an assessment can help.

Is imposter syndrome linked to anxiety and depression?

Yes. A 2020 systematic review of 62 studies found imposter feelings were often comorbid with depression and anxiety and were associated with burnout. That review found no tested treatments for imposter feelings themselves, so care usually focuses on treating any anxiety or depression and on changing the thinking patterns involved.

When to see a psychiatrist

If self-doubt has turned into constant anxiety, exhaustion or low mood, it is worth seeing a doctor. If you are having thoughts of ending your life, call 999.

Care here is personal: built around your history, your health and what you want to change, and reviewed with you as it goes.

Sources

• Bravata et al., Journal of General Internal Medicine, 2020 (PMID 31848865)