Paranoia is far more pervasive in the general population than anyone was willing to admit, a new study finds. Mumbling and furtive glances seem to be everywhere. In our daily interactions with others, we pick up on facial and other cues that help us judge whether or not to trust another person. These judgments, however, are error-prone and can lead to exaggerated or unfounded fears about threats from others. These paranoid thoughts can range from thinking strangers are looking at you critically, or that others are spreading nasty rumors about you, to the feeling that others are deliberately trying to harm you in some way. ‘Paranoid thoughts are often triggered by ambiguous events, such as people looking in one’s direction or hearing laughter in a room,’ said lead researcher Daniel Freeman, Wellcome Trust researcher at the Institute of Psychiatry at King’s College London. This phenomenon can be tricky to study, Freeman said, because it’s difficult to recreate such social interactions in the lab. ‘Virtual reality allows us to do just that, to look at how different people interpret exactly the same social situation,’ he said. Freeman and his colleagues equipped 200 volunteers with virtual reality headsets. […]