Read about children under stress.

Their reactions swing back and forth and back and forth. It's characteristic.

Unless those two women are both gynecologists or obstetricians, and have carefully examined many photos of Elizabeth Smart before her abduction in consultation with a specialist in adolescent medicine, I would give their observations all the credence I would give to anything else I overheard at the beauty shop. To wit: anything's possible, but what's likely?

Any child trying actively to conceal her identity, with no internal conflict and actively complicit, would never have mentioned her original name.

As for "running away", think on this: the Simbianese Liberation Army convinced Patty Hearst that she had joined them, although she was manifestly kidnapped. She was even given a weapon. You think Elizabeth Smart could not have been convinced that she had "run away", and was therefore no longer wanted by her real family?

You want insight, try here and here. Battered adults stay in abusive situations. Why not a 14-year-old?

Drudge likes the sensational. Captivity is, sadly, routine.

Regards--
Mary Anne