Virtual reality study of paranoid thinking in the general population

Freeman, Daniel; Pugh, Katherine; Antley, Angus; Slater, Mel; Bebbington, Paul; Gittins, Matthew; Dunn, Graham; Kuipers, Elizabeth; Fowler, David

doi:10.1192/bjp.bp.107.044677

Cited by 236 publications

(210 citation statements)

References 39 publications

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“…Our central findings, in a sample of relatively high-functioning college students, are loosely consistent with Freeman and colleagues's findings that the combination of anxiety and the experience of perceptual anomalies increases the risk that an individual will report feeling persecuted (Freeman et al, 2005a;Freeman et al, 2008a;Freeman et al, 2008b). However, the effects of anxiety and perceptual aberrations appear to be independent and additive, with each making distinct, if subtle, contributions to different aspects of paranoid thinking.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 88%

“…Unlike prior research focused on anxiety, perceptual anomalies, and paranoia, which has typically treated paranoia as a unidimensional construct (e.g., (Freeman et al, 2005a;Freeman et al, 2005b;Freeman et al, 2008b;Martin et al, 2001), we examined associations among social anxiety, perceptual abnormalities, and Rawlings and Freeman's (1996) five proposed factors for sub-clinical paranoia, which they based on a factor analysis of a large item set drawn from established, theoretically-driven measures of paranoia and related constructs. We elected to use Rawlings and Freeman's (1996) model for two primary reasons.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Associations among perceptual anomalies, social anxiety, and paranoia in a college student sample

Tone

Goulding

Compton

2011

Psychiatry Research

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Recent evidence suggests that normal-range paranoid ideation may be particularly likely to arise in individuals disposed to both social anxiety and perceptual anomalies. This study was designed to test the hypothesis that among college students in an unselected sample, social anxiety and experience of perceptual anomalies would not only each independently predict the experience of self-reported paranoid ideation, but would also interact to predict paranoid patterns of thought. A diverse sample of 644 students completed a large battery of self-report measures, as well as the five-factor Paranoia/Suspiciousness Questionnaire (PSQ). We conducted hierarchical multiple regression analyses predicting scores on each PSQ factor from responses on measures of social anxiety, perceptual aberration, and the interaction between the two constructs.Current general negative affect was covaried in all analyses. We found that both social anxiety and perceptual aberrations, along with negative affect, predicted multiple dimensions of paranoia as measured by the PSQ; the two constructs did not, however, interact significantly to predict any dimensions. Our findings suggest that perceptual aberration and anxiety may contribute to normal-range paranoid ideation in an additive rather than an interactive manner.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 88%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Associations among perceptual anomalies, social anxiety, and paranoia in a college student sample

Tone

Goulding

Compton

2011

Psychiatry Research

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“…Negative emotions (anxiety and depression) have also been shown to be associated with dimensions of paranoia in clinical and non-clinical populations (Freeman et al 2005(Freeman et al , 2008, and there is strong evidence from large clinical cohort studies that they are specifically implicated in the development and maintenance of persecutory delusions Fowler et al 2012). Such affective dysregulation has been suggested to be an aetiological pathway to psychosis (van Os & Kapur, 2009).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Negative cognition, affect, metacognition and dimensions of paranoia in people at ultra-high risk of psychosis: a multi-level modelling analysis

et al. 2015

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n Morrison, A.P. et al. (2015) Negative cognition, affect, metacognition and dimensions of paranoia in people at ultra-high risk of psychosis: a multi-level modelling analysis. Psychological Medicine, 45(12), pp. 2675-2684.There may be differences between this version and the published version. You are advised to consult the publisher's version if you wish to cite from it.http://eprints.gla.ac.uk/109839/ Background. Paranoia is one of the commonest symptoms of psychosis but has rarely been studied in a population at risk of developing psychosis. Based on existing theoretical models, including the proposed distinction between 'poor me' and 'bad me' paranoia, we aimed to test specific predictions about associations between negative cognition, metacognitive beliefs and negative emotions and paranoid ideation and the belief that persecution is deserved (deservedness).Method. We used data from 117 participants from the Early Detection and Intervention Evaluation for people at risk of psychosis (EDIE-2) trial of cognitive-behaviour therapy, comparing them with samples of psychiatric in-patients and healthy students from a previous study. Multi-level modelling was utilized to examine predictors of both paranoia and deservedness, with post-hoc planned comparisons conducted to test whether person-level predictor variables were associated differentially with paranoia or with deservedness.Results. Our sample of at-risk mental state participants was not as paranoid, but reported higher levels of 'bad-me' deservedness, compared with psychiatric in-patients. We found several predictors of paranoia and deservedness. Negative beliefs about self were related to deservedness but not paranoia, whereas negative beliefs about others were positively related to paranoia but negatively with deservedness. Both depression and negative metacognitive beliefs about paranoid thinking were specifically related to paranoia but not deservedness.Conclusions. This study provides evidence for the role of negative cognition, metacognition and negative affect in the development of paranoid beliefs, which has implications for psychological interventions and our understanding of psychosis.

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“…In front of them they could see an audience composed of a small number of animated virtual characters. [14], the London underground [2], the Milgram recreation [16], the virtual bar [11], the socially anxious virtual character [12] and the medical consultation [13].…”

Section: Slater's Experiments On Virtual Charactersmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Freeman et al [2] ran an experiment in which participants stood inside a virtual London underground train containing a number of virtual characters that were programmed to have neutral behavior and not interact with the participant. They found that participants with a history of paranoid delusions and also a sizable proportion of healthy members of the public had paranoid thoughts about the virtual characters thoughts and behavior towards them even though the characters behavior was objectively unrelated to the participant.…”

Section: Slater's Experiments On Virtual Charactersmentioning

confidence: 99%

Creating Virtual Characters

Gillies

2018

Proceedings of the 5th International Conference on Movement and Computing

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An encounter with a virtual person can be one of the most compelling experiences in immersive virtual reality, as Mel Slater and his group have shown in many experiments on social interaction in VR. Much of this is due to virtual reality's ability to accurately represent body language, since participants can share a 3D space with a character. However, creating virtual characters capable of body language is a challenging task. It is a tacit, embodied skill that cannot be well represented in code.This paper surveys a series of experiments performed by Mel Slater and colleagues that show the power of Virtual Characters in VR and summarizes details of the technical infrastructure used, and Slater's theories of why virtual characters are effective. It they discusses the issues involved in creating virtual characters and the type of tool required. It concludes by proposing that Interactive Machine Learning can provide this type of tool.

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Virtual reality study of paranoid thinking in the general population

Abstract: This is the most unambiguous demonstration of paranoid ideation in the general public so far. Paranoia can be understood in terms of cognitive factors. The use of virtual reality should lead to rapid advances in the understanding of paranoia.

Cited by 236 publications

References 39 publications

Associations among perceptual anomalies, social anxiety, and paranoia in a college student sample

Associations among perceptual anomalies, social anxiety, and paranoia in a college student sample

Negative cognition, affect, metacognition and dimensions of paranoia in people at ultra-high risk of psychosis: a multi-level modelling analysis

Creating Virtual Characters

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