Extreme Overvalued Beliefs: How Violent Extremist Beliefs Become “Normalized”

Abstract

Extreme overvalued beliefs (EOB) are rigidly held, non-deusional beliefs that are the motive behind most acts of terrorism and mass shootings. EOBs are differentiated from delusions and obsessions. The concept of an overvalued idea was first described by Wernicke and later applied to terrorism by McHugh. Our group of forensic psychiatrists (Rahman, Resnick, Harry) refined the definition as an aid in the differential diagnosis seen in acts of violence. The form and content of EOBs is discussed as well as group effects, conformity, and obedience to authority. Religious cults such as The People’s Temple, Heaven’s Gate, Aum Shinrikyo, and Islamic State (ISIS) and conspiracy beliefs such as assassinations, moon-hoax, and vaccine-induced autism beliefs are discussed using this construct. Finally, some concluding thoughts on countering violent extremism, including its online presence is discussed utilizing information learned from online eating disorders and consumer experience.

Cognitive‐affective drivers of fixation in threat assessment

“…The belief is not one that is ordinarily accepted by other members of the person's culture or subculture" (APA, 2013, p. 826) (our emphasis added). This differs from key tenets of the original Wernicke definition which explicitly states that it is a belief shared by others -a position we adopt (Rahman, 2018;Rahman, Grellner, Harry, Beck, & Lauriello, 2013). We have argued elsewhere that the absence of such a defined and clear category of rigidly held, nondelusional beliefs in American psychiatry and psychology creates in the forensic context an unreasonable burden for the expert at trial in presenting an alternative to delusion for the trier of fact to consider in "state of mind" or insanity litigation (Rahman et al, 2019;Rahman, Resnick, & Harry, 2016).…”

“…This construct, which we recently refined and began to validate from earlier work by Wernicke (1892Wernicke ( , 1906 and McHugh (McHugh, 2006;McHugh & Slavney, 1998), is a second cognitive driver for pathological fixation (Rahman, 2018;Rahman et al, 2019Rahman et al, , 2020:…”

“…This construct, which we recently refined and began to validate from earlier work by Wernicke (1892, 1906) and McHugh (McHugh, 2006; McHugh & Slavney, 1998), is a second cognitive driver for pathological fixation (Rahman, 2018; Rahman et al, 2019, 2020):

“An extreme overvalued belief is one that is shared by others in a person's cultural, religious, or subcultural group. The belief is often relished, amplified, and defended by the possessor of the belief and should be differentiated from an obsession or a delusion.

…”

“…We will begin by discussing delusion (a fixed, false and idiosyncratic belief), which is pertinent to threat assessment depending on the content of the delusion(s). Second, we will discuss overvalued idea, which has a strong provenance in British scholarship and led to the refined definition and study of extreme overvalued belief (Rahman, 2018; Rahman et al, 2020; Rahman, Harry & Resnick, 2016; Rahman, Meloy, & Bauer, 2019). It is a belief shared by others in their culture or subculture and is amplified, relished and defended by the possessor of the belief.…”

Terrorism and Contemporary Religious Cults: Jim Jones, Shoko Asahara and Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi

“…introduce the third cult leader to be discussed in this study (Rahman, 2018). A figurehead representing the supposedly Islamic-inspired vandalism of numerous ancient religious sites, Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi was, until his death in 2019, the leader of ISIS (commonly called "Islamic State").…”