It’s the end of the week, this week I’ve been researching a particular book with my teammate Edward McGurran. The book is entitled “Cognitive Therapy for Delusions, Voices and Paranoia” by Paul Chadwick, Max Birchwood and Peter Trower. Whilst Edward concentrated on the largest and most informative chapter in the book (chapter 1) I did chapters 2, 4, 5 & 7 which also had a great deal of informative information. For the process of this report I will discuss this report by chapter to highlight important parts of information, with my own opinions on the topics. Chapter 2 – “The Problem of Therapy and The Problem of Engagement”
In this chapter it expressed how difficult it can be for somebody to express their own emotions to a clinical expert or to others. The book mentioned however that even though people may have trouble expressing themselves verbally, they also subconsciously express themselves in nonverbal behaviour (such as body language etc) this is known as emotional leakage. But using body language in order to properly identify someone’s state of mind isn’t a perfect solution; however there’re other ways to find out what somebody’s feeling and that is called gestalt awareness exercises. This is a series of tests that helps identify what people feel by usage of pictures. How does this aid Team Mercury however? Since we’re doing paranoia the methods of testing have to be ethical, and if people are not able to express their emotions through words this might be a good way of finding out their inner emotions at the time. However we’re are still in the early stages of research and testing has yet to truly be explored but it’s a good bit of information to have on hand in the future.
That was the most important bit of information that we got from this chapter but there was also other information that might be useful. It revealed a bit more about anxiety (a common emotion associated with paranoia) and how it’s accompanied by defensive and avoidance behaviour and how to tell someone is anxious from them avoiding/leaving situations to other forms such as averting somebody’s gaze and subtle non-verbal responses. Also mentioned is that people are reacting to what are called biologically prepared stimuli where people’s instincts have a powerful reaction to what people do in different situations. These points are all important for our research because not only do we know how to tell if somebody is anxious but can also look into material based on people’s instincts and ways to measure it, which will also widen our academic scope on our project area.
Chapter 4 – “Challenging Delusions”
Delusions are a figment of paranoia and this book offered a good definition on delusions. Here is the definition: “Historically it has been argued that individuals form delusions because they are faced with what seems an insufferable threat, and that the delusion is a form of psychological defence without which the person would inwardly collapse” (Jaspers, 1962). Therefore from this it means that delusions itself it trying to protect yourself from some threat (that isn’t actually there). This is a very important element of paranoia, because paranoia itself is based around persecution of the self from others. This will aid Team Mercury as we have a clearer understanding on delusions; however it might be worthwhile to look a little bit more into the main causes of someone becoming delusional.
Chapter 5 – “Voice: Engagement and Assessment”
The next chapter that I researched into was about voices. Even though it’s not always completely associated with paranoia, it still a figment of paranoia in some people, probably not so much as delusions but it still an important area to look into. First of all the book breaks down three types of voices that users experience, these are the following.
- Omnipotence – A belief in a powerful voice that is inescapable, leaving individuals to feel constricted by the voices power. Making them at times depressed and helpless. Most individuals feel anxious with omnipotent voices.
- Omniscience – A voice which possesses an individual’s thoughts, behaviours, fears, experience and self-evaluation. This can leave the user exposed and vulnerable.
- Compliance – Voices which are benevolent and makes individuals comply with its commands.
The problem with researching into voices and associating them with paranoia is the fact that voices are usual associated with a severe mental state, however the actual concept of voice can possibly be implemented into a video game world (if that’s what we’re doing) The book even gives a good explanation on the description of voices (i.e. their attributes). Below is a list of what makes up a voice:
- They usually speak with clarity and at normal volume
- They’re repetitive and their words have emotional force.
- Sometimes there is more than one voice.
- Most voices are male.
- Most voice hearers listen to voices that are usually of a superior social class of their own.
With this list it will be easy to create voices in a game that contain those following attributes. However, whether or not this will induce and increase the chances of making somebody paranoid, is something that I can only hold an opinion on at the moment. Perhaps further reading or testing is the only method to find this out.
Chapter 7 – “Cognitive Therapy for Paranoia”
Out of all the chapters I’ve researched this one if probably the most informative and helpful of them all. It mentions that there’re two types of paranoia. The first one is known as persecution (poor me) paranoia; where the person tends to blame others and to see themselves as victims. They have a tendency to interpret threats (voices etc) as persecutory because they blame others. These types of paranoid people come into fray usually from being ignored, rejected or not being appreciated. This type of paranoia is also associated with beliefs such as self-righteousness and self-pity.
The second type of paranoia is punishment (bad me) paranoia; where individuals tend to blame themselves and also see themselves as bad allowing a justification for people punishing them. Unlike persecution paranoids they interpret threats differently, they interpret them as punishing because of the fact they feel guilty and blame themselves. The reason people are paranoid this way is usually from a disturbance in their ego or because they received criticisms/disapproval. These types of paranoid people are usually anxious, avoidant and depressed. Below is a table (taken from the book) which shows the two different types of paranoia and their differences.
| Delusion Theme | Punishment | Persecution |
| Focus of paranoia | Very wide (e.g. general public, people on the bus) | A few named and known individuals or organisations |
| Delusional conviction | Unstable | Stable and total |
| Susceptibility to change | Open to hypothetical challenge | Resistant to hypothetical challenge |
| Grandiose element | Absent | Strong |
| Affect | Anxiety and guilt | Anger |
| Behaviour | Avoidance/escape | Confrontational |
| Motivation | Hide own badness from others | Have persecutors revealed as bad |
Because of the information in this chapter, Team Mercury now knows that we have two types of paranoia which we might meet during our testing and research, this is helpful because not only does it tell us what to look for when somebody’s paranoid but to also distinguish what sort of paranoid person they’re at the time, in order to make a more detailed conclusion on our project.
Conclusion
This book has been a mighty help in our research. Not only have I been able to find out key points about delusions and voices but also been able to find a strong clear definition of paranoia and that is has two major sub-categories, which can only help our team widen our knowledge and search into the subject area. Not only have I found research in this area but also possible testing procedures (gestalt) which may indeed be helpful because of the ethical policies associated with paranoia. Most of the information in this report has been condensed down for easier reading and highlights the most important parts of my research, however, I have the full research documents up on our forums (click for link) that has quotes and pages which I have noted down.
This week I’ll be looking into a book entitled “Understanding Emotions” by Keith Oatley and Jennifer M.Jenkins. Hopefully this book will give a clear description of emotions that will aid my group in the project.
References
- Chadwick, P. Birchwood, M. & Trower, P., 1996. Cognitive Therapy for Delusions, Voices and Paranoia. West Sussex: John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
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