paranoia

• POS: Noun
• HYPHEN: par=a=noi=a

CIDE DICTIONARY

paranoia, n. [NL., fr. Gr. para`noia.].

•  A chronic form of insanity characterized by very gradual impairment of the intellect, systematized delusion, and usually by delusions of persecution or mandatory delusions producing homicidal tendency. In its mild form paranoia may consist in the well-marked crotchetiness exhibited in persons commonly called “cranks.” Paranoiacs usually show evidences of bodily and nervous degeneration, and many have hallucinations, esp. of sight and hearing.  [Webster 1913 Suppl.]
•  Unwarranted suspicion of the motives of others; -- used colloquially in a non-technical sense.  [PJC]

OXFORD DICTIONARY

paranoia, n.
1 a mental disorder esp. characterized by delusions of persecution and self-importance.
2 an abnormal tendency to suspect and mistrust others.

Derivative

paranoiac adj. & n. paranoiacally adv. paranoic adj. paranoically adv. paranoid adj. & n.

Etymology

mod.L f. Gk f. paranoos distracted (as PARA-(1), noos mind)

THESAURUS

paranoia

alternating personality, brain disease, catatonia, catatonic schizophrenia, crack-up, dementia praecox, depersonalization, disconnection, dissociation, dissociation of personality, double personality, dual personality, emotional disorder, emotional dissociation, emotional instability, functional nervous disorder, hebephrenia, hebephrenic schizophrenia, insanity, maladjustment, manic-depressive psychosis, melancholia, mental disorder, mental dissociation, mental illness, multiple personality, nervous breakdown, nervous disorder, neurosis, paranoid personality, paranoid psychosis, paraphrenia, personality disorder, personality disorganization, problems in living, psychosis, reaction, schizoid personality, schizoidism, schizophrenia, schizothymia, social maladjustment, split personality

ROGET THESAURUS

paranoia

Insanity

N insanity, disordered reason, disordered intellect, diseased mind, unsound mind, abnormal mind, derangement, unsoundness, psychosis, neurosis, cognitive disorder, affective disorder, insanity, lunacy, madness, mania, rabies, furor, mental alienation, aberration, paranoia, schizophrenia, dementation, dementia, demency, phrenitis, phrensy, frenzy, raving, incoherence, wandering, delirium, calenture of the brain, delusion, hallucination, lycanthropy, brain storm, vertigo, dizziness, swimming, sunstroke, coup de soleil, siriasis, fanaticism, infatuation, craze, oddity, eccentricity, twist, monomania (caprice), kleptodipsomania, hypochondriasis, melancholia, depression, clinical depression, severe depression, hysteria, amentia, screw loose, tile loose, slate loose, bee in one's bonnet, rats in the upper story, dotage, insane, mad, lunatic, loony, crazy, crazed, aliene, non compos mentis, not right, cracked, touched, bereft of reason, all possessed, unhinged, unsettled in one's mind, insensate, reasonless, beside oneself, demented, daft, phrenzied, frenzied, frenetic, possessed, possessed with a devil, deranged, maddened, moonstruck, shatterpated, mad-brained, scatter brained, shatter brained, crackbrained, touched, tetched, off one's head, maniacal, delirious, lightheaded, incoherent, rambling, doting, wandering, frantic, raving, stark staring mad, stark raving mad, wild-eyed, berserk, delusional, hallucinatory, corybantic, dithyrambic, rabid, giddy, vertiginous, wild, haggard, mazed, flighty, distracted, distraught, depressed, agitated, hyped up, bewildered, mad as a March hare, mad as a hatter, of unsound mind, touched in one's head, wrong in one's head, not right in one's head, not in one's right mind, not right in one's wits, upper story, out of one's mind, out of one's wits, out of one's skull, far gone, out of one's senses, out of one's wits, not in one's right mind, fanatical, infatuated, odd, eccentric, hypped, hyppish, spaced out, imbecile, silly, like one possessed, the mind having lost its balance, the reason under a cloud, tet exaltee, tet montee, ira furor brevis est, omnes stultos insanire.