Decoding Delusions: A Comprehensive Guide to Managing Extreme Beliefs

Delusions and strong beliefs can be profoundly distressing and limiting to healthy living for individuals experiencing them. Mental health professionals working with these individuals also face significant challenges, particularly due to the lack of consensus on what constitutes a delusional belief. For the first time, Decoding Delusions brings together literature and treatment guidance materials to offer clinicians an up-to-date, culturally informed, and illustrated guide to managing the spectrum of delusions and extreme beliefs encountered in daily practice.

Understanding Delusions: Definitions, Research, and Cultural Aspects

In Part I, expert chapter authors define and assess delusions, examining the current research literature into their linguistic and cultural aspects, as well as the history of their treatment. A crucial lived-experience perspective is also provided, offering a nuanced understanding of delusions.

Interventions for Delusional Presentations

Part II features insights from international experts on interventions, including third-wave cognitive-behavioral models such as compassion-focused therapy, for delusional presentations such as:

• Persecutory paranoia
• Delusional jealousy
• Erotomania
• Capgras syndrome
• Delusions of thought possession
• Trauma as a pathway to delusions

A nuanced discussion of working with patients from Japanese backgrounds is also included, enhancing cultural competency and encouraging consideration of extreme beliefs through a cultural lens.

Delusion Management in Specific Settings

In Part III, chapter authors explore the management of delusions in specific settings, including:

• Delusions in forensic settings
• Use of remote technologies such as Zoom and digital media for measurement-based care

Live-action demonstrations of key clinical skills at work are provided through video clips, making Decoding Delusions a unique and valuable resource.

A Novel Approach to Extreme Beliefs

Unlike any other resource currently available, Decoding Delusions proposes an approach that supports the exploration of extreme beliefs with the aim not only of distress reduction but also meaningful recovery.

Publication details:

• Publisher: Amer Psychiatric Pub Inc
• Release date: June 11, 2023
• Language: English
• Pages: 414
• ISBN-10: 1615372954
• ISBN-13: 978-1615372959