Paranoia

In popular culture, the term paranoia is usually used to describe excessive concern about one's own well-being, sometimes suggesting a person holds persecutory beliefs concerning a threat to themselves or their property and is often linked to a belief in conspiracy theories.

Paranoia depicted in popular culture

In popular culture paranoia is often represented as including:

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• Belief in having special powers or being on a special mission (a "delusion of grandeur");
• Conspiracy theories, such as seeing seemingly unrelated news events as parts of a larger, typically conspiratorial plan
• Black helicopters and other mass surveillance
• Persecution from powerful adversaries such as UFOs, terrorists, the Men in Black, secret societies or demons
• Mind control through invisible rays, and tinfoil hats to combat them;
• Fear of poisoning, adulterated food (e.g., aspartame) or water (e.g., fluoridation) as part of a secret plot.
• Reading a story (or watching a movie) and feeling that one's life is exactly like the story.