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Being in a reductionist culture, the idea of fragmentation leads to extreme images of a piece of glass - shattering into disparate shards that must be glued back togther like a three-dimensional jigsaw puzzle.
For Living systems, (what might be called) "Fragmentation" is usually much more subtle and gentle; and there is a seamless continuous spectrum between simple adaptations through severe and chronic structural fragmentation of the identity.
If you take a look at Varela's *Duality diagram, it shows a system that is self embedded, with a minor separation that is present because there is "not one", but that separation is not so great as to mean that there is "two".
Living systems are constantly adapting. As part of that adaptive process they modulate the degree of communication - and that adaptive modulation slightly shifts the balance between "not-one" and "not-two". So fragmentation in Living systems means a reduction in communication, or at most a (temporary) loss of communication at some levels (but not all levels/layers - because total loss of communication would mean physical death). This organically shifting balance is overlaid on top of Gordon Pask's principle of Amicity - the innate interest of all living organisms, organelles and systems on all scales in the signs of activity in all other aspects of their lived environment - both internal and external.
Given this definition and broad definition, Fragmentation can be seen as just one possible direction that might be taken away from an ideal homeostatic optimum. Fragmentation is a reduced clevel of communication, eventually (inevitably - when it passes a critical threshold) getting to the stage of causing difficulties amnd secondary effects because the loss of coherence and coordination between various processes. But similarly it is possible for communication (excitability) to increase above normal homeostatic levels. This is very familiar in concepts such as information overload, or hypersensitivity (including sensory hypersensitivity such as hyperacusis or the sensitivity to light during migraines), or an over-active immune system (e.g. cascading allergies), or central sensitisation (escalating pain).
The progression from normal homeostatic range through to hypersensitivity (hyper-excitability), through to numbness (which induices and includes fragmentation) in chronic adaptive states was described by Russian physiologist AA Ukhtomsky. Also see the section on backgound theory [1].
References & Notes