Estimated amount of Targeted Individuals

This memo summarizes the current best approximation of how many people worldwide experience phenomena consistent with TI patterns. The estimate relies on large-scale epidemiological data and a set of logical adjustments that help translate psychotic-like perceptual events into an approximate measure of prevalence.

The primary quantitative foundation comes from a comprehensive study by the University of Queensland, published via JAMA Psychiatry:
Psychotic Experiences in the General Population of 18 Countries.

In this survey, 31,261 adults from 18 countries were asked about six types of perceptual or delusional experiences. Of the total sample, 5.8% reported at least one such episode in their lifetime. Within this 5.8%, the most important indicator for our purposes is the frequency distribution. Participants reporting more than ten episodes (meaning recurring or near-persistent impact) made up 26% of this group. Applied to the general adult population, that equals roughly 1.5%.

An additional 0.4% of respondents were excluded from the final analysis because their symptoms led to clinical diagnoses such as schizophrenia, psychosis, or manic depression, and many had been prescribed antipsychotics. The relevant quote from the study:
“We made the a priori decision to exclude individuals who had PEs with positive findings of a screen for possible schizophrenia and/or psychosis and manic depression and/or mania… This process resulted in the exclusion of 140 respondents (0.4%).”

Given that such diagnoses frequently arise from symptom presentation alone (something familiar to many TIs), it is reasonable to add these individuals to the estimate instead of removing them. Doing so yields a combined figure of 1.9% of the adult population who appear to experience strong, repeating, or sustained effects that fit the expected profile.

To globalize the number, adolescents (approximately 1.3 billion) are excluded purely because the study did not include them. Applying 1.9% to the remaining adult population gives an approximate total of 127.3 million affected individuals worldwide. Actual numbers may be higher, as similar experiences can occur under eighteen as well.

Supplementary indicators (such as community polls) cannot provide reliable statistics yet, but they illuminate outcomes. A small Reddit poll of self-identified TIs showed the following distribution:

• Never sought medical care: 39%
• Forced into medical care; diagnosed with schizophrenia: 10%
• Forced into medical care; diagnosed with temporary psychosis: 10%
• Sought medical care voluntarily; diagnosed with schizophrenia: 29%
• Sought medical care voluntarily; diagnosed with temporary psychosis: 12%

This means 61% ended up in medical institutions, 20% involuntarily, 39% received a schizophrenia diagnosis, and 22% received diagnoses such as psychosis or depression. While the sample is tiny, the proportions illustrate how official diagnoses often intersect with TI-type experiences.

Additional context comes from voice hearing related perceptual research, such as the Yale COPE scales:
Yale Researchers Develop First Tool to Measure the Amount and Types of Perceptual Experiences
This study notes that hearing voices may occur in up to 15% of the general population. Such figures help explain why resource-based models assuming a human-only source become difficult to maintain without expanding the underlying hypothesis.

With the current data, the most coherent working estimate for the adult population remains close to two percent. This should be treated as a broad global approximation, acknowledging that episode duration varies, that diagnostic practices filter experiences in specific ways, and that underreporting and misclassification are likely.

Final figures of TI amount estimate

• Prevalence: 1.9% of adult population (combined 1.5% frequent/recurring + 0.4% clinically excluded cases).
• Global adults over 18 = 5,816,293,412
• Estimated people worldwide matching TI profile (1.9% of adults) ≈ 127.3 million

Conclusion

TI experiences are often classified as "schizophrenia" by the medical field. WHO reports roughly 23 million affected worldwide, or 0.29% of the population at that time. This is close to the 0.4% clinically diagnosed in the University of Queensland study. The small difference likely comes from definitions: TI symptoms are often categorized as schizoaffective disorder, bipolar, or manic depression, which are not included in WHO statistics.

The takeaway is clear: about 0.3%–0.4% of the population experience TI phenomena severe enough to be registered or diagnosed.

At the same time, far more experiences go unreported. The study sample mostly includes people visiting medical facilities for any reason, which may or may not include TI symptoms. Those who never sought care, or were emergency patients, are left out. Numbers might differ if we polled the general population, but for now this is our best estimate.

1.9% of adults, roughly 1 in 53, seems high, but there are reasons not to dismiss it:

• TI experience varies in intensity; many can tolerate it without crisis.
• The experience feels real, external, and unquestionable, so medical help is often not sought.
• Many TIs are told the harassment is meant to discredit them as mentally ill, reinforcing avoidance of care.
• Stigma and lifetime consequences of a schizophrenia label deter even the distressed.
• Medical treatment is often unhelpful, as widely known among the community.
• TIs tend to be secretive, fearing disbelief or judgment, even from close family or friends.

These factors together keep numbers of formal diagnoses lower than the true scale of experiences. Some argue schizophrenia is different from TI experience, and that TI imitates it to discredit sufferers. But in practice, there is no clear distinction: patterns, procedural progression, and real-world influence are the same. Every case of so-called "paranoid schizophrenia" that shows conscious, structured, and externally impacting behavior appears to be a result of a natural (or rather supernatural) phenomenon, not a brain malfunction.

For examples of this in practice, see Perevalov case excerpts: https://www.otir.org/research/publications/memos/memo-04.