Be advised :
Any similarities with living personas is not purely coincidental :
"A suspicious mind is always spotting hidden meanings nobody else even considers are there. Left unchecked, suspicious thinking can evolve into a paranoid personality disorder, a state in which you may not even think you have a "problem". But have."
PPD, or Paranoid Personality Disorder
The central characteristics of PPD are
(a) a high degree of mistrustfulness and suspicion, always looking for evidence that the other is set against them or their beliefs,
(b) a confrontational and disputatious attitude, forever questioning the motivations and trustworthiness of the others and their actions, and
(c) feelings of certainty, without justification or proof, that others are intent on harming or exploiting them
Symptoms of Paranoid Personality Disorder
Expressively Defensive : Tenacious and firmly resistant to sources of external influence and control, always expecting derogation, malice, and deception.
Interpersonally Provocative : Bears grudges and is unforgiving of those of the past, displays fractious and abrasive attitude with recent acquaintances, and precipitates exasperation and anger by a testing of loyalties and preoccupation with hidden motives.
Mistrustful Cognitive Style : Is unwarrantedly skeptical, and cynical of the motives of others, construing innocuous events as signifying hidden or conspiratorial intent, with tendency to read hidden meanings into benign matters and to magnify tangential or minor difficulties into proofs of duplicity and treachery
Inviolable Self-Image : Has persistent ideas of self-importance and self-reference, perceiving attacks on one's character not apparent to others.
Unalterable Objects : Internalized representations of significant early relationships are a fixed and implacable configuration of deeply held beliefs and attitudes.
Projection Regulatory Mechanism : Actively disowns undesirable personal traits and motives, and attributes them to others; remains blind to one's own unattractive behaviors and characteristics, yet is overalert to, and hypercritical of, similar features in others.
Inelastic Morphologic Organization : Create an overstrung and taut frame that is so uncompromising in its accommodation to changing circumstances that unanticipated stressors are likely to precipitate explosive outbursts.
Irascible Mood-Temperament : Attempts to appear unemotional and objective, but is edgy, envious, jealous, quick to take personal offense and react angrily.
Causes of Paranoid Personality Disorder
Most professionals subscribe to a biopsychosocial model of causation, such as how a person interacts - in their early development - with their family and friends and other children.
Treatment of Paranoid Personality Disorder
Typically involves long-term psychotherapy with a therapist. The social consequences of this serious mental disorder – family disruption, estrangement of acquaintances, friends and relatives - can be calamitous.
Credits :
- Institute for Advanced Studies in Personology and Psychopathology
- Encyclopedia of Mental Disorders
- Psych Central Staff