This video answers the question: How can someone reason with somebody who is delusional? I've heard this question a few times and different versions of this question and I think sometimes the question is really talking about delusions, but I think sometimes what people mean is: How do I reason with somebody who's not being rational? I'm going to look at different levels of delusions here, so I can really answer the different types of questions. A delusional belief is a belief that's maintained despite being contradicted by what is generally accepted to be a rational argument or reality. We also see with delusions that no matter what evidence is presented, the belief is not going to change their mind. One of the difficult parts about the question is that it may be hard to know if someone is really delusional or not. That's really the realm of mental health counselors to figure out if somebody has true delusions.
Delusions fall on a continuum. When we talk about a true delusion or pathological delusion, it's really hard to figure this out from a brief interaction. There are alternative explanations to why somebody believes something other than them being delusional for example: somebody could be misinformed, somebody could just be illogical, or somebody could have a temporary bias based on strong emotions.
When considering whether something's delusion or not it's important to keep in mind that the belief itself isn't necessarily really important, it's the reaction to contradictory evidence.
Pathological delusions may be observed with a number of mental disorders like schizophrenia, delusional disorder, major mood disorders (major depressive disorder or bipolar disorder), and substance use disorders. Under the mental disorder delusional disorder, we see a few types of mentioned here: erotomanic, grandiose, jealous, persecutory, and somatic. We also see a specifier with this disorder called “with bizarre content.”
