I am not sure what your point is about intention. Institutional and systemic causes of what? You are extremely non-specific about what your actual argument is,

I am not sure what your point is about intention. Institutional and systemic causes of what? You are extremely non-specific about what your actual argument is, you just say repeatedly how in vogue it is and that people intend things different to outcomes...but I think my earlier reply would likely be repeated. Right, you are hung up on the idea that the purpose of the OP is to prove "reality". Again, reality is nothing to do with it...it isn't relevant, it makes no sense in the context of this discussion. And it does reflect the deployment of the concept because college students are humans who have thoughts...so you can use the same tools that are used in a clinical setting because you are also dealing with humans there. As I mentioned, cognitive distortions occur in all people to some degree, that can result in something that needs treatment, it can have no effect...it just depends. But the point of the OP is to highlight that cognitive distortions are correlated to safetyism, it is not a diagnosis of anyone, it is nothing to do with any clinical phenomena. Again, if you just look at the Wiki on cognitive distortions, it is fairly clear how the authors get to this conclusion. I would say that safetyism is a cognitive distortion (you are weighting improbable threats highly, attempting to read the mind of people you don't know, ironically making generalizations about people...this seems, to me, like it should be obvious...as is the situation we are seeing now where anxiety about this stuff has actually increased).