Ideas of Reference and Delusions of Reference

Ideas Of Reference And Delusions Of Reference


This article is about a mental illness. For the album by Psyopus, see Ideas of Reference.

Ideas of reference and delusions of reference involve people having a belief or perception that irrelevant, unrelated or innocuous phenomena in the world refer to them directly or have special personal significance: 'the notion that everything one perceives in the world relates to one's own destiny'.

In psychiatry, delusions of reference form part of the diagnostic criteria for psychotic illnesses such as schizophrenia, delusional disorder, or bipolar disorder during the elevated stages of mania. To a lesser extent, it can be a hallmark of paranoid personality disorder. Such symptoms can also be caused by intoxication, especially with hallucinogens or stimulants like methamphetamine.

Read more about Ideas Of Reference And Delusions Of Reference:  Freudian Views, Anti-psychiatry, Delusions of Reference, Examples, Literary Analogues

Famous quotes containing the words ideas of, ideas, reference and/or delusions:

    Perceiving myself through others’ ideas of what it means to be a woman has made it difficult for me to achieve the necessary commitment [to be a poet].
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    The new supplants the old. Yet men’s minds are stuffed with outworn bunk. Educating the young in the latest findings of authorities and scholars in the social sciences is important. It is equally important to devise ways and means for aiding the middle-aged and old to reexamine hang-over unscientific doctrines and ideas in the light of recent discovery and research.
    Mary Barnett Gilson (1877–?)

    I think, for the rest of my life, I shall refrain from looking up things. It is the most ravenous time-snatcher I know. You pull one book from the shelf, which carries a hint or a reference that sends you posthaste to another book, and that to successive others. It is incredible, the number of books you hopefully open and disappointedly close, only to take down another with the same result.
    Carolyn Wells (1862–1942)

    Some are able and humane men and some are low-grade individuals with the morals of a goat, the artistic integrity of a slot machine, and the manners of a floorwalker with delusions of grandeur.
    Raymond Chandler (1888–1959)