I don't think a "dolormeter" measures torture, tsuwm. It only measures sad. A veximeter measures mad. And torture can be maddening.

And here's something which hasn't been mentioned yet about torture. Extreme psychological torture can result in madness, for example, schizophrenia where the personality splits itself into several personalities* to protect itself from psychological abuse.

This sort of madness is actually a pyschological defence mechanism. It presents any abuser with a multiple victim and more or less evens the odds for the victim when the victim feels outnumbered or otherwise overwhelmed by superior force.

BTW bullying in the schoolyard has been recognized as a serious form of psychological torture in recent years. And recent research indicates that girls are as guilty of it as boys.

Until quite recently, the literature on bullying focused solely on physical and verbal aggression. Since the 1990s, however, researchers have also begun to examine relational aggression. Relational aggression refers to any act that actively excludes a person from making or maintaining friendships or being integrated into the peer group--such as spreading rumors, or excluding and socially isolating a person (e.g., Bjoerkqvist, Lagerspetz, & Kaukianen, 1992). Studies have found that while boys tend to use overt forms of aggression (such as physical and verbal aggression) in bullying, girls' bullying behaviors often focus on damaging an individual's social connections within the peer group (e.g., Crick & Grotpeter, 1995; Crick, Casas, & Ku, 1999). Researchers are beginning to broaden their definitions of aggression and bullying, and to examine the consequences of relational aggression for all parties involved (e.g., Crick, 1996; Tomada & Schneider, 1997). The topic of relational aggression has also captured the attention of the general public, through such books as Rachel Simmons' (2002) Odd Girl Out.

http://snipurl.com/cpgh

Note: I tried Maverick's Shift + Enter solution to split this link to avoid wide screen. But it didn't work. So I tried tsuwm's snipurl.com solution. And it works like a charm! Thanks, tsuwm. [snipurl.com is very handy.]

* The "3 Faces of Eve" must be a different condition**:

Schizophrenia is not split personality

misunderstood disease
No other psychological disorder is as widely misunderstood as schizophrenia. The public often equates schizophrenia with "multiple personality", assuming that schizophrenic patients fluctuate between a placis, conventional personality and a monstrous, violent one as in the famous story of Dr Jekyll and mr Hyde. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Only one personality
Although the word schizo-phrenic literally means "split mind", the term refers to the fragmentation or splitting up of normally integrated psychological functioning. A schizophrenic patient has only one personality, but his or her mental activity is often severely disorganized.

http://snipurl.com/cpll

** Multiple Personality Disorder (DID)

Does multiple personality disorder really exist?

Multiple personality disorder, now officially known as dissociative identity disorder (DID), remains the object of bitter controversy. One thing's clear, though--it's not nearly as common as people thought just a few years ago.

http://www.straightdope.com/columns/031003.html