VR Study Says 40% of Us Are Paranoid

Roland Piquepaille writes "UK researchers have recently used virtual reality to check if people had paranoid thoughts when using public transportation. Their VR tube ride experiment revealed that 40% of the participants experienced exaggerated fears about threats from others. Until now, researchers were relying on somewhat unreliable questionnaires to study paranoid thoughts which are often triggered by ambiguous events such as someone laughing behind their back. With the use of VR, psychiatrists and psychologists have a new tool which can reliably recreate social interactions. As the lead researcher said, VR 'is a uniquely powerful method to detect those liable to misinterpret other people.'."

Comments

Re:Not all fear is paranoia

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't get cautious around most nerdy people, but you better believe I get cautious around ones that look like they've bought into the geek culture. Is that paranoid? How do I know that they aren't in fact some wannabe terrorist? Saying "don't judge a book by its cover" toward people is irrational. Appearances are one of the most effective ways to gauge what sort of person you are dealing with.