Narrative review reveals rising rates of technology-themed delusions among patients with psychosis, highlighting how modern digital culture reshapes core persecutory and control themes.
Key Points
Trace the historical evolution of technology-themed delusions, characterize their contemporary clinical phenomenology, and examine underlying neurocognitive mechanisms and psychiatric assessment implications.
Searched PubMed/MEDLINE, Scopus, and APA PsycInfo without date restrictions through May 1, 2026, using a SANRA-informed narrative synthesis framework.
Included 43 sources comprising 9 case reports/series, 14 empirical studies, 8 reviews, and 12 historical or conceptual sources examining technology-related delusional content.
Identified five primary thematic categories: surveillance and hacking, implant and control delusions, Truman Show-type broadcasting, social media referential ideas, and emerging algorithmic/AI-mediated control.
In the largest contemporary cohort (N=228), technology-themed delusions were present in 51.7% (104/201) of patients with delusional thought content, with the odds increasing significantly over time (OR 1.15, 95% CI 1.01-1.31; P=.04 per admission year).
Observed that aberrant salience, cognitive models of persecutory ideation, technological unfamiliarity, digital immersion, and culturally available conspiracy material shape these clinical presentations.