Delusions of Reference refer to situations wherein an individual experiences unimportant environmental information as personally important. This environmental information is commonly social information such as other people’s conversations, their emotional states, or laughter, and it is all interpreted as being directly related to, or targeted toward the individual.
Some individuals experiencing delusions of reference will feel as though they are directly communicating with strangers, others will believe that news readers or characters in television shows are talking to them, while others still will interpret ‘environmental cues’ such as traffic or weather patterns as personal indicators about their day.
Research suggests that people experiencing delusions of reference cannot differentiate between ‘self’ and ‘non-self’ directed information, even when they are consciously aware of the unlikeness that their perceptions are accurate (Menon, et al., 2011).
Delusions of reference are highly likely to co-occur with hallucinations, or within the same psychotic episode as a hallucination (Ben-Zeev, Morris, Swendsen, & Granholm, 2012). They can be highly debilitating and distressing to experience, especially when the individual is aware that they are not true or experience them in conjunction with paranoid delusions.
References
Speculative Neuroscience 