A nurse is conducting a group therapy session for several clients. The group is laughing at a joke one of the clients told, when a client who is schizophrenic jumps up and runs out of the room yelling. "You are all making fun of me!" The nurse should identify this behavior as which of the following characteristics of schizophrenia?

A. Magical thinking involves believing that one’s thoughts or actions can cause events to occur in a way that defies logic (e.g., thinking stepping on a crack will break someone’s leg), which is not evident here. B. Associative looseness refers to fragmented, disorganized, or illogical thinking that affects speech, not the perception of others’ behavior. C. Ideas of reference occur when a person believes that unrelated events or actions of others are directed at them personally. In this scenario, the client interprets the group’s laughter as being about them, which exemplifies this characteristic. D. Delusions of grandeur involve exaggerated beliefs about one’s own importance, power, or identity, which does not apply in this situation.