To arrive at their finding, researchers studied the people suffering from Truman syndrome, a psychological disease in which patients believe that they live in a dreamy world where their actions, talks are carefully recorded in a camera and other people and some government agencies are watching their programs like the character in The Truman Show.
Dr. Joel Gold, director of psychiatrics at the Bellevue Hospital Center, has experienced five patients of Truman syndrome in the last two years. Many of them particularly mentioned The Truman Show, a 1998 film which was about a character who spent whole of his life on camera, though he did not know about the camera.
After this, Gold has found 50 more people who believe their lives are merely TV reality shows. Gold stated that some patients were feeling happy while others were deeply upset.
Dr. Gold said, “The question is really: Is this just a new twist on an old paranoid or grandiose delusion ... or is there sort of a perfect storm of the culture we're in, in which fame holds such high value?"
He said that delusions are basically sensory hallucinations. It is a psychological disease as well as neurological problem. But "Truman" delusions are more comprehensive, involving not just a few friends or relatives but society at large. This research has shown that culture and technology both can affect the people.
Dr. Joel Gold’s brother, Ian Gold, a philosophy and psychology professor at McGill University in Montreal, said that reality shows not only make healthy people delusional, "but, at the very least, it seems possible to me that people who would become ill are becoming ill quicker or in a different way."
Other researchers still think that "Truman syndrome" is a culture based delusion. Vaughan Bell, a psychologist affiliated with King's College, London said, “I don't think that popular culture causes delusions but I do think that it is only possible to fully understand delusions and psychosis in light of our wider culture."
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