Stimulating the Social Brain

Although paranoid ideation is typically associated with severe mental illnesses such as schizophrenia or bipolar disorder, 10-15% of individuals in the general population report experiencing paranoid thoughts on a regular basis. These individuals who are high in sub-clinical paranoia can show impaired work and social functioning as compared to individuals low in sub-clinical paranoia. The wide spread prevalence and negative functional impact of heightened paranoia reinforces the need to develop interventions that may help to reduce problematic patterns of paranoid thinking in both healthy individuals and those with mental illness. Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation (tDCS) is a form of noninvasive neurostimulation which has been proposed as a therapeutic procedure in numerous psychiatric conditions. TDCS therefore may be a promising therapeutic technique for reducing symptoms of psychosis, and specifically paranoia. This study will compare experiences of paranoid ideation in individuals who are high in sub-clinical paranoia across two conditions: active anodal tDCS and sham tDCS.