Paranoia

The term Paranoia has two related but distinct meanings. In everyday language it is used a name for excessive worry about a person's own wellbeing, sometimes suggesting the person holds persecutory beliefs concerning a threat to themselves or their property.

In the original Greek ‘paranoia’ means self-referential, and it is this meaning which has been adopted in psychiatry, especially European psychiatry, in reference to a delusional belief (see delusions). Specifically the terms paranoia is used to denote a delusional belief that is self-referential, but which may not necessarily be persecutory. For example, a person who has a delusional belief that they are a important religious figure (e.g. Jesus, or the Dalai Lama) may still be diagnosed as having a paranoid belief, or if they hold this belief in the context of schizophrenia, as having paranoid schizophrenia. Paranoia and delusions in general are considered an important (if not the most important) diagnostic feature of psychosis.

Common paranoid delusions may include the belief that the person is being followed, poisoned, or loved at a distance (often by a media figure or important person, a delusion know erotomania or De Clearambault syndrome). Other common paranoid delusions may include that the person has an imaginary disease or parasitic infection (delusional parasitosis), that the person is on a special quest or has been chosen by God, has thoughts inserted or removed from conscious thought or that the person’s actions are being controlled by an external force.

Paranoia is often associated with psychotic illnesses, particularly schizophrenia.

See also: delusion, psychosis, schizophrenia

Paranoia is also the name of a science-fiction role playing game set in a dystopian future. The tone of the game is humorous and tongue-in-cheek. The setting is an underground city which is controlled by a paranoid computer who uses the players as agents to eliminate mutants and secret society members. The computer is under the belief that it is the victim of Communists which it must seek out and destroy. The humor of the game is provided by the fact that all players are mutants and secret society members, and much of the dynamics of the game involves trying to double-cross and one-up fellow players.

Further Reading