ABSTRACT
This chapter examines new aspect of the maintenance of persecutory delusions: the use of safety behaviours. It argues that safety behaviours also contribute to the maintenance of persecutory delusions and explores the results concerning safety behaviours. Safety behaviours were found to be used by the participants, and were meaningfully related to panic cognitions. Safety behaviours are likely to result in disconfirming evidence being negated, and thus contribute to delusion maintenance. There is literature related indirectly to the use or absence of safety behaviours. Many of the acts may be safety behaviours—that is, attempts by individuals with persecutory delusions to prevent or reduce perceived threats. Acting on persecutory delusions is associated with individuals feeling frightened or anxious as a result of the delusion. A semi-structured interview format was chosen because the content of persecutory delusions is wide ranging, and the safety behaviours used will be similarly varied and therefore difficult to capture in a structured questionnaire.
