Paranoia--a distrust of everyone and their motivations--strikes people from time to time. For some, paranoia becomes ingrained in their personality. A 2018 study...
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5966466/
...examined subjects who rated as paranoid based on screening survey responses as they heard a fictional story written for the experiment. The story was designed to provide ambiguous social information, that left it up to the listener to interpret.
The study identified the left Heschl's gyrus, which is auditory cortex, indicating more intense listening in paranoid subjects. Another area was left TGd, that is Pheme in neuromythography. Pheme is the Greek goddess of fame, and assigned because left TGd has a peculiar specialization in remembering proper names and attributes of famous people and fictional characters we have never met. This is consistent with processing the attributes of the characters introduced in the story. Right 9mdp (RmPFC in the image above) is Zeus, who often shows up in studies involving judging people. Finally, the LTPJ region appears to be left TPOJ1, that is called Austen in our model, referencing Jane Austen and the rich narrative tapestries that she wove. TPOJ1 usually shows up when subjects are following extended written or spoken narratives.
The significance and myth recorded in our neuromemex are:
Significance: When listening to an ambiguous social narrative, paranoids had higher activation in left TPOJ1, left TGd, and right 9mdp.
Myth: In paranoids listening to an ambiguous social narrative
Austen closely tracked the narrative
Pheme built profiles of the characters
Zeus grew suspicious
