Secondary delusions

These delusions are secondary because they arise from an attempt to explain or understand other abnormal experiences or morbid affective moods, which may include primary delusion. They may be irrational and held with extraordinary conviction but, in that the experience triggering them is evidently unusual, they are understandable. Delusions are more likely to arise in people who have strong ego boundaries and who are rigidly detached from their environment, and the development and maintenance of idiosyncratic ideas at odds with the environment may be in order to maintain their identity. Again, a secondary delusion attempts to reconcile incompatible conditions - a disturbing experience at odds with reality - in order to reduce the tension caused by cognitive dissonance. Because this is an impossible task, a complex, interlocking argument is built up, ever more complex and idiosyncratic as experience increases in perplexity. This is delusional systematization.