Articoli di riviste sul tema "Social sciences -> social sciences -> conspiracy theories"

Social sciences and humanistic disciplines that showed an interest in conspiracy theories are dominantly relying on either a cultural perspective (e.g. history, anthropology, ethnology, sociology, cultural studies, literature, etc.) or a positivistic perspective (psychology and political science). Between these two perspectives lays a gap in the way the nature of the phenomenon is understood, as well as its manifestation, the methodology used and how they interpret results and their implications. In this paper we are aiming to show that this topic is in its core a sociocultural question and that the perspective of sociocultural theory represents a way to bridge the aforementioned gap by using features of both approaches. If the cultural approach sees conspiracy theories as a product of a culture, and the positivistic approach as a question of the individual, then through a sociocultural perspective we are looking at how an individual actively acts in a society which developed the discourse of conspiracy theories through time. By adopting this view, we can study how individuals purposefully participate in contextually situated (co-)construction and transformation of meanings, discourse and conspiratorial narratives, as well as how they utilize conspiracy theories and other artifacts.

Conspiracy theories are attracting increasing attention from political scientists, much of it negative. Three recent books, from the disciplines of political science, cultural history and social theory, provide a valuable critical corrective. Uscinski and Parent argue that conspiracy theories are connected to partisan distrust and are largely stable across the twentieth century. Michael Butter uses detailed historical cases from the Puritan witch trials to the Red Scare of the 1950s to show the central and influential role that conspiratorial beliefs have played in American history. Luc Boltanski focuses on conspiracy narratives in early detective and spy novels, but situates them in a broader account of the relation between the state, the social and political sciences, and popular representations of political power. Taken together, these books place the problem of conspiracy theory firmly in the context of democratic politics, opening important empirical and conceptual questions about partisanship, populism, publicity and secrecy. Boltanski, L. (2014) Mysteries and Conspiracies: Detective Stories, Spy Novels and the Making of Modern Societies. Translated by Catherine Porter. Cambridge: Polity Press. Butter, M. (2014) Plots, Designs and Schemes: American Conspiracy Theories from the Puritans to the Present. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter. Uscinski, J. E. and Parent, J. M. (2014) American Conspiracy Theories. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Conspiracy theories are often viewed as the manifestation of a “conspiracy mentality” grounded in power-challenging attitudes. Contrary to this approach, it has been proposed that conspiracy theories targeting relatively powerful groups (i.e., upward conspiracy theories) may be ideologically distinct from conspiracy theories targeting relatively powerless groups (i.e., downward conspiracy theories). We tested this contention in the Romanian context ( n = 723, preregistered) and compared the ideological and socioeconomic correlates of anti-government (i.e., a relatively powerful group) and anti-Roma (i.e., a relatively powerless group) conspiracy beliefs. Using Principal Components Analysis, we showed that both categories of conspiracy beliefs are statistically distinct. Right-wing authoritarianism was significantly more related to anti-Roma conspiracy beliefs than to anti-government conspiracy beliefs. However, against our expectations, both types of conspiracy beliefs did not relate differently to subjective socioeconomic status. Overall, the ideological discrepancies between upward and downward conspiracy beliefs were less marked in the Romanian context. Finally, conspiracy mentality was more related to anti-government conspiracy beliefs than anti-Roma conspiracy beliefs. This corroborates the notion that generic measurements of conspiracist ideation may be mostly a measurement of upward conspiracy beliefs, and emphasizes the relevance of distinguishing conspiracy theories based on the types of groups they target.

Many conspiracy theories and hoaxes circulate on social media and internet sites. The problems that the author exposes are the definition of conspiracy theories and hoaxes, recognizing the media for their dissemination and the various dangers caused, the connection between conspiracy theories and hoaxes, motives, and obstacles in implementing prevention, resistance and the conviction. This article is written as a source for the public to know the dangers of conspiracy theories and hoaxes and their prevention. The research method used is qualitative research. Conspiracy theories are a type of hoax, but hoaxes do not have to develop into conspiracy theories. The main motive is economic motive. People needs to improve digital literacy. Law enforcers shall be more active in investigating the conspiracy theorists.Keywords: Conspiracy Theory, Hoax, Hoax Sentence

Much recent literature has examined the correlates of anti-vaccination beliefs, without specifying the mechanism that creates adherence to these debunked ideas. We posit that anti-vaccination beliefs are an outcome of a general psychological propensity to believe in conspiracies based on new research on the interconnectedness of conspiracy beliefs. These ideas are tested with a confirmatory factor analysis and a seemingly unrelated regression (SUR) model of a nationally representative U.S. sample from the 2016 American National Election Studies. The confirmatory factor analysis shows that anti-vaccination beliefs highly correlate with belief in the unrelated conspiracies that Obama is a Muslim and 9/11 trutherism. Our SUR models also show that all three of these very different beliefs have similar predictors. All three have a negative correlation with political trust, political knowledge, education, and a positive correlation with authoritarianism. Thus, anti-vaccination beliefs are shown to be part of a psychological propensity to believe in conspiracies.

The current COVID-19 pandemic has been accompanied by the circulation of an unprecedented amount of “polluted” information, especially in the social media environment, among which are false narratives and conspiracy theories about both the pandemic and vaccination against COVID-19. The effects of such questionable information primarily concern the lack of compliance with restrictive measures and a negative attitude towards vaccination campaigns, as well as more complex social effects, such as street protests or distrust in governments and authorities in general. Even though there is a lot of scholarly attention given to these narratives in many countries, research about the profile of people who are more prone to believe or spread them is rather scarce. In this context, we investigate the role of age, compared with other socio-demographic factors (such as education and religiosity), as well as the role of the media (the frequency of news consumption, the perceived usefulness of social media, and the perceived incidence of fake information about the virus in the media) and the critical thinking disposition of people who tend to believe such misleading narratives. To address these issues, we conducted a national survey (N = 945) in April 2021 in Romania. Using a hierarchical OLS regression model, we found that people who perceive higher incidence of fake news (ß = 0.33, p < 0.001), find social media platforms more useful (ß = 0.13, p < 0.001), have lower education (ß = −0.17, p < 0.001), and have higher levels of religiosity (ß = 0.08, p < 0.05) are more prone to believe COVID-19-related misleading narratives. At the same time, the frequency of news consumption (regardless of the type of media), critical thinking disposition, and age do not play a significant role in the profile of the believer in conspiracy theories about the COVID-19 pandemic. Somewhat surprisingly, age does not play a role in predicting belief in conspiracy theories, even though there are studies that suggest that older people are more prone to believe conspiracy narratives. As far as media is concerned, the frequency of news media consumption does not significantly differ for believers and non-believers. We discuss these results within the context of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Popular conspiracy theories, like those about JFK, the attacks of 9/11, the death of Princess Diana or the swine flu vaccination, are generally depicted in the social sciences as pathological, irrational and, essentially, anti-modern. In this contribution it is instead argued that conspiracy culture is a radical and generalized manifestation of distrust that is embedded in the cultural logic of modernity and, ultimately, produced by processes of modernization. In particular, epistemological doubts about the validity of scientific knowledge claims, ontological insecurity about rationalized social systems like the state, multinationals and the media; and a relentless ‘will to believe’ in a disenchanted world – already acknowledged by Adorno, Durkheim, Marx and Weber – nowadays motivate a massive turn to conspiracy culture in the West.

Conspiracy theories in online spaces, such as anti-vaccination or QAnon, present a unique amalgamation of misinformation, disinformation, and propaganda disguised in entertaining, attention-grabbing content that may appeal to peoples' cultural, moral, or social identities. Studies aiming to understand how people may engage with conspiracy theory content online, or how they may lose belief in conspiracy theories often approach research from a purely theoretical or empirical point of view. In this work, through in-depth interviews with former believers of more than 12 conspiracy theories, with experiences across almost two decades and numerous online platforms, we aim to contribute an understanding of how various online and offline factors synergize to shape a user's engagement, tenure, and disengagement in online conspiracy theorizing. We further investigate how some users recover from conspiracy theorizing with the help of online recovery communities. We find how pre-existing biases and predispositions towards conspiracy theorizing often carry over in online spaces where a user's conspiracy theory worldviews further evolve through content recommendations, interactions in online communities, and socially-primed self-reflections. We also find reasons, such as exposure to inconsistencies in theories or toxicity and anti-social attitudes in online spaces, through which users get disillusioned from conspiracy theories. Our work has implications in bringing forward often unobserved impacts of internet-mediated conspiracy theorizing on the believers---the resulting mental health issues such as depression, distrust and anxiety, and social isolation---which is comparable to the indoctrination trauma. Moreover, our interviews reveal an important role played by online communities in helping users recover from conspiracy theory beliefs by finding empathy and solidarity in fellow former believers. We conclude by providing a path forward for how social computing researchers can contribute online community designs that aid existing issues surrounding safety, inclusivity, and lack of resources in existing online conspiracy theory recovery communities.

Byford and Billig examine the emergence of anti-Semitic conspiracy theories in the Yugoslav media during the war with NATO. The analysis focuses mainly on Politika, a mainstream daily newspaper without a history of anti-Semitism. During the war, there was a proliferation of conspiratorial explanations of western policies both in the mainstream Serbian media and in statements by the Yugoslav political establishment. For the most part such conspiracy theories were not overtly anti-Semitic, but rather focused on the alleged aims of organizations such as the Bilderberg Group, the Council on Foreign Relations and the Trilateral Commission. However, these conspiracy theories were not created de novo; writers in the Yugoslav media were drawing on an established tradition of conspiratorial explanations. The tradition has a strong anti-Semitic component that seems to have affected some of the Yugoslav writings. Byford and Billig analyze anti-Semitic themes in the book The Trilateral by Smilja Avramov and in a series of articles published in Politika. They suggest that the proliferation of conspiracy theories during the war led to a shifting of the boundary between acceptable and non-acceptable political explanations, with the result that formerly unacceptable anti-Semitic themes became respectable. This can be seen in the writings of Nikolaj Velimirovic, the Serbian bishop whose mystical anti-Semitic ideas had previously been beyond the bounds of political respectability. During the war, his ideas found a wider audience, indicating a weakening of political constraints against such notions.

In a world where brands find increasing difficulties to communicate their message, in part due to the splitting consumer’s attention and in part due to the difficulty in having consumers believe their messages, we also notice everyday growth of conspiracy theories in many fields (politics, health, social relations, …) who seem to thrive and find it easier than ever to enter people’s lives and gather believers. Can marketing learn something from the success of major conspiracy theories and their facility in reaching people’s attention and earning their trust? Should it? Should marketing fear the success of conspiracy theories as they seem to result from decentralized and uncontrolled forms of communication and tribe creation? This paper sets out to acquire lessons from the success of Conspiracy Theories (CTs) that can be applied by SMEs and startups. For that purpose, a survey was used to collect primary data, using constructs that measure people’s conspiracy tendencies (generic conspiracy beliefs scale), their attitude toward advertising and their personality profile (Big Five Inventory – BFI). The data gathered was used to look for correlations. Are people with the more positive view of advertising more prone to believe in CTs? Is there some relation between BFI’s personality profiles and CT belief or negativistic views of advertising? Is there some relation between the information sources people prefer and their tendency to adopt conspiracy beliefs and/or more positive attitudes towards advertising? The results show a clear positive correlation between peoples’ conspiracy belief tendencies and their attitude towards ads. Conspiracy beliefs were modelled as a result of attitude towards ads, age, social class and belief in popular myths. These results provided hints for startups/SMEs marketing strategies, by suggesting that larger advertising budgets can be fought with strategies based on different communication channels (surely social networks) and messages centered on the most common script for conspiracy theories, “big corporations / big brother doesn’t want you to know this”.

This study examined the individual and collective influence of conspiracy theories, misinformation and knowledge revolving around COVID-19, on public adoption of the Nigerian government’s containment policies. The study adopted the Survey, and Focus Group Discussion (FGD) methods. For the survey, a sample of 466 respondents were drawn from Facebook, Instagram, Messenger and WhatsApp, while 24 participants were selected for the FGD. The Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) and thematic approach were used to analyse data generated from the study. Results revealed a COVID-19 conspiratorial thinking among survey respondents and FGD participants, who were also familiar with the orgy of unbridled dissemination of misinformation and conspiracy theories in the social media space. Majority of respondents were knowledgeable about government’s COVID-19 containment policies and were practicing the recommended safety measures. Their decision was influenced by trust in opinion leaders, especially family members and medical experts.

The paper is a contribution to current debates about conspiracy theories within philosophy and cultural studies. Wittgenstein’s understanding of language is invoked to analyse the epistemological effects of designating particular questions and explanations as a ‘conspiracy theory’. It is demonstrated how such a designation relegates these questions and explanations beyond the realm of meaningful discourse. In addition, Agamben’s concept of sovereignty is applied to explore the political effects of using the concept of conspiracy theory. The exceptional epistemological status assigned to alleged conspiracy theories within our prevalent paradigms of knowledge and truth is compared to the exceptional legal status assigned to individuals accused of terrorism under the War on Terror. The paper concludes by discussing the relation between conspiracy theory and ‘the paranoid style’ in contemporary politics.

Belief in conspiracy theories is close related with the adoption of behavioral patterns often associated with a direct dispute of scientific research, institutional and governmental practices. The recent Covid-19 pandemic revealed an ecosystem of stories and narratives promoting alternative explanations about a real public threat. The exposure to these narratives and their persuasion towards people’s cognitive structures is a crucial issue to be examined to identify the different strategies implemented, by individuals and groups, in order to address a direct threat to society. In the current exploratory research, we examined whether believing in conspiracy theories about Covid-19 pandemic, is possible to predict semantic networks as cognitive structures. The analysis of the research findings provided different patterns of thought about individual exposure to Covid-19 conspiracy theories, their persuasiveness, and the different levels of compliance to (state-promoted) health measures. We discuss the importance of future research focusing on the level of acceptance of the role of different social institutions. A systematic analysis of conspiracy theories rationale is possible to address the cognitive bias organized on belief systems that offer a logical problem solving in social uncertainties. A more thorough study on the individual and group perception of the role of institutions, the level of their acceptance or dispute, as well as their direct and indirect impact on the development of socially responsible behaviors, within a shared social reality, could enhance our knowledge towards the development of effective social policies to confront the next public health crisis.

This exploratory study aims at identifying macro-social factors associated with the international variance of belief in conspiracy theories. We computed a Conspiracy Index for 22 Western and non-Western countries based on the results of an online survey on conspiratorial beliefs. Stepwise regression analyses show that more than 70% of the international variance of this Conspiracy Index is explained by the following three national variables: the level of democracy, the unemployment rate, and the perceived level of public sector corruption. Conspiracy theories thus appear to be more commonly endorsed in countries where people cannot take an active part in the political life of their country (low level of democracy), where they may feel socially threatened (high unemployment rate), and where institutions and authorities are perceived as untrustworthy (high perception of public sector corruption).

AbstractThe massacres in Sampit, Central Kalimantan in 2001 were the latest in a series of horrific clashes between Madurese migrants and indigenous peoples, which, since 1996, killed thousands and displaced hundreds of thousands, the primary victims being Madurese. As in earlier clashes, a relatively minor incident or an isolated killing served as the trigger to a conflict more profoundly rooted in interethnic grievances, historical injustices, growing ethnic empowerment, and burgeoning political competition in Indonesia's transition to decentralized governance. The article compares and evaluates Dayak and Madurese accounts of the violence, its background and causes, focusing on a key period when latent tensions transformed into mass killings. Two different theories emerge, each positing a conspiracy: the Dayaks regarded the Madurese as out to take over the province and the Madurese accused the Dayaks of plotting to take over their land and jobs. The Dayak theory further sees the problem as one of cultural incompatibility and claims that the Dayak people spontaneously rose to pre-empt the threat posed by the Madurese. This notion that the violence was caused by cultural factors was factored into government policy and peace initiatives, and was to affect the prospects for reconciliation and return of the displaced. The authors suggest these understandings of violence played a key role in determining how the reconciliation process was run.

AbstractMembers of the public can disagree with scientists in at least two ways: people can reject well-established scientific theories and they can believe fabricated, deceptive claims about science to be true. Scholars examining the reasons for these disagreements find that some individuals are more likely than others to diverge from scientists because of individual factors such as their science literacy, political ideology, and religiosity. This study builds on this literature by examining the role of conspiracy mentality in these two phenomena. Participants were recruited from a national online panel (N = 513) and in person from the first annual Flat Earth International Conference (N = 21). We found that conspiracy mentality and science literacy both play important roles in believing viral and deceptive claims about science, but evidence for the importance of conspiracy mentality in the rejection of science is much more mixed.

Online discussion platforms provide a forum to strengthen and propagate belief in misinformed conspiracy theories. Yet, they also offer avenues for conspiracy theorists to express their doubts and experiences of cognitive dissonance. Such expressions of dissonance may shed light on who abandons misguided beliefs and under what circumstances. This paper characterizes self-disclosures of dissonance about QAnon-a conspiracy theory initiated by a mysterious leader "Q" and popularized by their followers ?anons"-in conspiratorial subreddits. To understand what dissonance and disbelief mean within conspiracy communities, we first characterize their social imaginaries-a broad understanding of how people collectively imagine their social existence. Focusing on 2K posts from two image boards, 4chan and 8chan, and 1.2 M comments and posts from 12 subreddits dedicated to QAnon, we adopt a mixed-methods approach to uncover the symbolic language representing the movement,expectations,practices,heroes and foes of the QAnon community. We use these social imaginaries to create a computational framework for distinguishing belief and dissonance from general discussion about QAnon, surfacing in the 1.2M comments. We investigate the dissonant comments to characterize the dissonance expressed along QAnon social imaginaries. Further, analyzing user engagement with QAnon conspiracy subreddits, we find that self-disclosures of dissonance correlate with a significant decrease in user contributions and ultimately with their departure from the community. Our work offers a systematic framework for uncovering the dimensions and coded language related to QAnon social imaginaries and can serve as a toolbox for studying other conspiracy theories across different platforms. We also contribute a computational framework for identifying dissonance self-disclosures and measuring the changes in user engagement surrounding dissonance. Our work provide insights into designing dissonance based interventions that can potentially dissuade conspiracists from engaging in online conspiracy discussion communities.

The coronavirus pandemic, though primarily a health issue, has had significant social, economic and political implications across the world. There are reasons to believe that some of the changes occurring are likely to be permanent even in a post-pandemic world, and there are even suggestions that the world may be entering a phase in which pandemics become recurrent. Making sense of all that the pandemic has brought has by no means been easy, even for scientists who have had to review and revise their claims as new discoveries about the virus are made. One of the fallouts of the pandemic has been a proliferation of conspiracy theories about the origin of the virus, as well as efforts to contain it. Summed up, these theories of various shades allege that certain powerful forces are behind the pandemic, in pursuit of some narrow ends that range from the political to the religious. In this paper, I analyse conspiracy theories and the motivations behind them. Situating conspiracy theories within the pandemic, I argue that they are best understood not within the framework of a single theory but by an understanding of how diverse motivations generate different, even contradictory conspiratorial accounts. I argue that whereas conspiracy theories have become a feature of modern society, and have been amplified in the age of technology, they have low credibility value in explaining the pandemic, while having significant implications. I also argue that if left unchecked, conspiracy theories have the capacity to further undermine governments’ capacity to respond to big crises in Africa in the future. I conclude that conspiracy theories are best managed in a pandemic through consistent, transparent engagement rooted in trust-building between the people and governments, especially in Africa.

Do we live in a "Golden Age of Conspiracy Theories?" In the last few decades, conspiracy theories have proliferated on the Internet with some having dangerous real-world consequences. A large contingent of those who participated in the January 6th attack on the US Capitol believed fervently in the QAnon conspiracy theory. In this work, we study the relationships amongst five prominent conspiracy theories (QAnon, COVID, UFO/Aliens, 9/11, and Flat-Earth) and each of their respective relationships to the news media, both mainstream and fringe. Identifying and publishing a set of 755 different conspiracy theory websites dedicated to our five conspiracy theories, we find that each of them often hyperlinks to the same external domains, with COVID and QAnon conspiracy theory websites having the strongest connections. Examining the role of news media, we further find that not only do outlets known for spreading misinformation hyperlink to our set of conspiracy theory websites more often than mainstream websites but this hyperlinking has increased dramatically between 2018 and 2021, with the advent of QAnon and the start of COVID-19 pandemic. Using partial Granger-causality, we uncover several positive correlative relationships between the hyperlinks from misinformation websites and the popularity of conspiracy theory websites, suggesting the prominent role that misinformation news outlets play in popularizing many conspiracy theories.

In the European area, we have recently noticed an increase in the spread of conspiracy theories and propaganda. Several crises (especially the crisis associated with the Covid-19 pandemic) have reduced the credibility of European/Western institutions in the eyes of many young people. In addition, some states are weakened by the rise of Pan-Slavism and nationalist ideas. In this context, is it necessary to reconsider the education of future European citizens? How to approach this if countries are facing multiple challenges atthe same time?

Abstract This article examines two categories in which claims of special knowledge are central: Gnosticism and conspiracy theories. In both cases, notions of what counts as ‘religion’ come into play in setting their boundaries, with only certain kinds of religious belief deemed as legitimate. Moreover, the category is privileged over the data. While these cases may be extreme, I contend that they point to a major failure of contemporary social sciences—a commitment to categories about data that leave us upholding the episteme that we should be critiquing.

Pivetti et al. (2021a; 2021b) examined links between COVID-related conspiracy beliefs and acceptance of vaccinations in Italy and Finland in 2020. They found that moral purity negatively predicted confidence in science, whereas political orientation predicted COVID-related conspiracy beliefs. Confidence in science, general conspiracy beliefs, and COVID-related conspiracy beliefs were found to negatively predict support for governmental restrictions and attitudes towards vaccines, and positively predict perceptions of informational contamination. Finally, attitudes towards vaccines in general strongly predicted attitudes towards the COVID-19 vaccine. The current research seeks to replicate these findings conceptually on a predominately Muslim sample (N = 570, M age = 26.69, 69.8% females) in Turkey in 2021, when the COVID vaccines were widely available. Measures of religiosity and left, center, and right political orientations were added to the original instrument. Hypothesized serial mediational models were tested using structural equation modelling. Results revealed that left and center political orientations positively predicted COVID-related conspiracy beliefs and confidence in science. Religiosity was negatively related to confidence in science. Confidence in science and COVID-related conspiracy beliefs predicted general attitudes toward vaccines. Conspiracy beliefs predicted COVID-related conspiracy beliefs, which in turn negatively predicted support for government restrictions and positively predicted distrust in mainstream media. Attitudes towards vaccines were strongly and positively related to attitudes toward COVID-19 vaccines. [This paper was added to the Special Issue on “Conspiracy Theories about Infectious Diseases” in a post-hoc manner. Online publishing allows the addition of new papers to a published special issue, thereby permitting a special issue to grow.]

The objective of this study is to examine some of the factors contributing to belief in conspiracy theories. They have gained considerable popularity among the public in recent years. They react more and more often to several socially significant events taking place around us, while coming up with an alternative explanation, especially for those events that concern a larger number of people. Due to the fast introduction of the Internet and the rapid development in the field of information and communication technologies, systems and means, conspiracy theories are penetrating very significantly especially in the field of mass media and notably in the field of new media. Today, social networks are the medium with the greatest spread of various conspiracy theories. It is one of the primary reasons why conspiracy theories have become the subject of our scientific interest. With the use of relevant methods of qualitative theoretical scientific research, in this work we present our research findings and a look at some selected factors contributing to belief in conspiracy theories to readers from the professional and lay public. Received: 8 February 2023 / Accepted: 16 April 2023 / Published: 5 May 2023

Widespread conspiracy theories may significantly impact our society. This paper focuses on the QAnon conspiracy theory, a consequential conspiracy theory that started on and disseminated successfully through social media. Our work characterizes how Reddit users who have participated in QAnon-focused subreddits engage in activities on the platform, especially outside their own communities. Using a large-scale Reddit moderation action against QAnon-related activities in 2018 as the source, we identified 13,000 users active in the early QAnon communities. We collected the 2.1 million submissions and 10.8 million comments posted by these users across all of Reddit from October 2016 to January 2021. The majority of these users were only active after the emergence of the QAnon conspiracy theory and decreased in activity after Reddit's 2018 QAnon ban. A qualitative analysis of a sample of 915 subreddits where the "QAnon-enthusiastic" users were especially active shows that they participated in a diverse range of subreddits, often of unrelated topics to QAnon. However, most of the users' submissions were concentrated in subreddits that have sympathetic attitudes towards the conspiracy theory, characterized by discussions that were pro-Trump, or emphasized unconstricted behavior (often anti-establishment and anti-interventionist). Further study of a sample of 1,571 of these submissions indicates that most consist of links from low-quality sources, bringing potential harm to the broader Reddit community. These results point to the likelihood that the activities of early QAnon users on Reddit were dedicated and committed to the conspiracy, providing implications on both platform moderation design and future research.

Objective. Analysis of the relationship between system justification, trust in the government, conspiracy beliefs and coronavirus restrictions. Background. The 2020 coronavirus pandemic has shown that people react differently to the restrictions associated with the coronavirus. In Russia, society is not willing to support restrictions and believes in conspiracy theories in the context of the coronavirus. Study design. The relationship between system justification and supporting coronavirus restrictions was examined. System justification was an independent variable, support for coronavirus restrictions was dependent, trust in the government and conspiracy belief consistently mediated this connection. The presence and nature of the relationship was checked using linear regression. Gender, age, and religiosity were counted as covariates. Participants. The sample consisted of 1677 residents of Russia (66.9% of women, aged 18 to 76, M=31.96, SD=10.96). Measurements. The Russian-language version of the J. Jost system justification scale, questions about trust in the government, attitudes towards coronavirus as a means of limiting freedoms and towards restrictions: closing the country’s borders and banning movement in the city. Results. It was found that there was a direct negative effect of system justification on supporting border closures and travel bans in the city with an indirect positive effect in the models with mediators. Conclusions. System justification can have different effects on supporting coronavirus restrictions.

CREATING CONSPIRACY BELIEFS: How Our Thoughts Are Shaped by Dolores Albarracín et al. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2022. 308 pages. Paperback; $39.99. ISBN: 9781108965026. *Conspiracy thinking is a prominent topic of discussion in American life today--and Christians, with their concern for truth, should not only be informed about, but contributing to, this discussion. This includes awareness of how scholars in the neuro-psychological and social sciences are contributing to our understanding of the nature of conspiracy thinking. *This book investigates the causes of conspiracy thinking in the United States. Its authors draw their findings from existing social scientific literature on conspiracism, general social psychology research, and six empirical statistical studies conducted during the last two years of the Trump presidency (2019-2021): three cross-sectional online surveys, a longitudinal phone panel survey on "deep state" conspiracy claims, a "manipulation" of fear experiment on the alleged relationship between the COVID-19 virus and 5G technology, and a social media study of Twitter hashtags and "fear words." *This book shares many similarities with previous academic works on conspiracy thinking--for example, Hofstadter (1965), Pipes (1997), Robins and Post (1997), Sunstein and Vermeule (2008), Barkun (2013), and Uscinski and Parent (2014)--but distinguishes itself by relying extensively on recent polling data and statistics instead of interviews, case studies, newspaper op-eds, or conspiracist media. Indeed, the authors consciously dispute psychological works that scrutinize the personality traits and life experiences of conspiracy believers, and political science works that link conspiracy fears to power asymmetries. Such approaches, they contend, insufficiently explain the process through which conspiracy beliefs are spread. They argue, instead, that psychological and political factors are themselves shaped by a mixture of personal, media, and social media contacts. *Their central aim is thus to examine how patterns of media consumption shape conspiracy beliefs, habits that are themselves affected by one's pre-existing feelings of anxiety, which is herein defined as a nonspecific "perception of threat [that] depends on relatively stable psychological motivations of belief defense [the desire to maintain a coherent set of beliefs], belief accuracy [the desire to maintain a realistic view of the world], and social integration [the desire for trust, status, and acceptance within a group], as well as sociopolitical factors and situational factors like communications and media exposure" (p. 163). *When these needs are not met, anxiety rises. But whereas desire for belief accuracy produces, on its own, an increase in critical discernment--and hence a decrease in false conspiracy beliefs--the combination of pre-existing anxiety (e.g., feelings of ostracism) with shared conspiracy narratives increases one's predisposition to believe conspiracy claims. When one's need for closure and community trumps their need for belief accuracy, new information will be interpreted in ways that justify their emotional state and existing beliefs. The emotional turmoil and social discomfort of anxious individuals make them more prone to accept conspiracist interpretations for troubling situations, drawing them into an alternative "media ecosystem." *Assent to conspiracy claims occurs when anxiety is assuaged by theories that offer plausible and unfalsifiable "proofs" of "hidden hand" driving events. Plausibility is achieved when a theory offers the believer historic similarity (similar plots occurred in the past), psychological similarity (the enemy's alleged motive is conceivable), and normative plausibility (other members of one's community share the same belief). The unfalsifiable nature of conspiracy claims lies in their assertion that proofs of a nefarious plot have been hidden or destroyed by the conspirators; such claims dovetail with the believer's existing distrust of authoritative sources of information. The repetition of conspiracist messages by like-minded others (friends, social networks, etc.), and by popular media (e.g., Fox News) reinforces these beliefs. The believer's wounded ego can further elicit schizotypy, paranoia, and narcissism, which serve as means of self-defence against debunkers and skeptics. *The influence of various media is proportional to time spent with, and trust placed in, these sources of information, along with the consumer's prior levels of neuroticism, suspiciousness, and impulsivity. Online media have an additional influence via their use of bots, individually tailored algorithms, and various forms of "information laundering" in reply threads and chatrooms. Heavy media consumption aligns the consumer's view of the world with the one shown in their preferred media. *The prime contribution of this book is its postulation that anxiety precedes conspiracy thinking (rather than the inverse), a psychological explanation for conspiracy belief that does not lead its authors to conclude, as others have, that conspiracism is inherently a form of neurosis. However, its heavy use of statistics, jargon, and unduly complicated flowcharts renders the text onerous, especially for those without statistical training. Given that this is meant to be the book's most 'important new input into the literature, it is also its greatest weakness. *Despite the great efforts made by its authors to produce a detailed empirical study of the effects of media on conspiracy beliefs, the book's conclusions are somewhat underwhelming as they echo the findings of many previous studies and offer few new insights into the topic. For instance, their claim that social interaction is the "proverbial elephant in the room" (pp. xiii, 205) is hardly convincing. The media consumption habits of conspiracy believers are a recurring theme throughout the literature, and none make the claim that conspiracy beliefs develop in an information vacuum. The book's conclusion that anxiety serves as an "intervening mechanism" (p. 87) between conspiracy claims and a person's needs for closure and social integration in not particularly revelatory either. That humans are social animals is an argument as old as Aristotle, and that conspiracy myths help insecure individuals improve their sense of social cohesion is at least as old as Karl Popper's "conspiracy theory of society."1 *The book's statistical data also exhibits several flaws, leading its authors to wrongly conclude, as Hofstadter did in 1965, that the phenomenon of conspiracy thinking is essentially a product of conservative angst2--a claim that has been powerfully disproven by many of Hofstadter's critics. This may be due to the timeframe of the authors' research studies, which were conducted mostly during and after President Trump's first impeachment trial (in 2019-2020), which elicited a massive conservative media backlash. It could also be due to their failure to examine long-term patterns of conspiracy chatter, which would have shown (see Uscinski and Parent, 2014) that conspiracy ideation ebbs and flows along political lines over longer periods of time. Their data also contains some unrepresentative samples, namely, the overrepresentation of low-wage earners, the unemployed, and the highly educated, and the underrepresentation of working-class high school graduates and Hispanics (pp. 243-44). *One could surmise that such flaws are due to an extraordinary historical context (the Trump presidency and COVID-19 restrictions), but they are also likely attributable to the implicit political biases of current social psychological research, which, as Duarte et al. demonstrated,3 is strongly skewed to the political left. This is made evident in the authors' clearly stated opinion that conservative media is the primary cause of conspiracy beliefs and related violence (pp. 224, 169-70) from which its audience--akin to cultists and terrorists--should be deprogrammed with "corrective alternatives" and ridicule (p. 215). This seems to contradict their 'primary claim that anxiety is the underlying cause (and not the product) of conspiracy beliefs, which should presumably be allayed with kinder methods than these. By identifying conspiracy theories as both a product of right-wing media and, simultaneously, as a "type of misinformation" (p. 11), the authors leave themselves open to the charge of circular reasoning. Indeed, their political bias is shown in their frequent use of contested progressive concepts and phrases such as "racialized," "Latinx," "pro-social behavior to reduce [one's] carbon footprint," and by 'connecting peaceable conservative media such as Focus on the Family to the use of gun violence by Edgar Maddison Welch in a Washington pizzeria (p. 219). *The small number of conspiracy theories on which the authors based their surveys is another example of skewed sampling. Most of these represent themes that cause far more anxiety to conservatives than liberals (for example, the "deep state," COVID-19 restrictions, illegal immigration, President Obama's birth certificate), while little attention is given to conspiracy theories that traditionally appeal to the political left (for 'example, JFK, 9/11, GMOs, "BigPharma," CIA malfeasance, Hurricane Katrina) or to progressives' fears about policing, systemic racism, abortion rights, or gender identity, making it all the more likely that their research subjects who displayed conspiracist thinking stood on the right side of the political fence. *Finally, the book spends too much time discussing tangentially pertinent psychological research (for example, the influence of music on pain and imitative suicide) and too little detailing the content and origins of the few conspiracy theories their research is based on (with the exception of the 2016 "Pizzagate" panic). This makes the book difficult for the layperson to follow, when it is compared to academic works such as those of Barkun4 or Uscinski and Parent,5 which are accessible to a nonspecialized audience. Few details are given, for instance, of the Tuskegee syphilis experiments, which are mentioned frequently but never in detail as an example of a genuine government conspiracy (rather than a significant but nonsinister breach of medical ethics). In the end, the book complements the rest of the literature but falls short of providing significant new insights, and is unlikely to elicit interest among laypersons, especially those who hold conspiracy beliefs. * Notes *1Karl R. Popper, Conjectures and Refutations: The Growth of Scientific Knowledge (New York: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1963). *2Richard Hofstadter, The Paranoid Style in American Politics, And Other Essays (New York: Knopf, 1965). *3José L. Duarte et al., "Political Diversity Will Improve Social Psychological Science," Behavioral and Brain Sciences 38 (2015): e130, https://doi.org/10.1017/S0140525X14000430. *4Michael Barkun, A Culture of Conspiracy: Apocalyptic Visions in Contemporary America (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2013). *5Joseph E. Uscinski and Joseph M. Parent, American Conspiracy Theories (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2014). *Reviewed by Michel Jacques Gagné, Champlain College, St. Lambert, QC J4P 3P2. Michel is a historian and author of Thinking Critically about the Kennedy Assassination: Debunking the Myths and Conspiracy Theories (Routledge, 2022).

This paper focuses on the underlying factors driving the demand for populism in North Macedonia. It presents an argument on populist attitudes, illustrating empirically that within this specific context, they are primarily driven by heightened dissatisfaction with state institutions. This dissatisfaction is manifested as perceived lack of external political efficacy, with state mechanisms failing to foster citizen inclusion in political processes. Additionally, this paper demonstrates that populism in this country of South East Europe is also significantly influenced by adherence to traditional values and beliefs in conspiracy theories. These findings are discussed in relation to the dominant theories on populist demand found in current literature. The objectives of this paper are twofold. Firstly, it seeks to examine the applicability of current theories to the case of North Macedonia. Secondly, it proposes a perspective on the factors stimulating populism within this context. To assess the effects of different factors on populist demand, we employ OLS regression modeling using survey data collected in June 2021. This study contributes to the existing literature on the demand side of populism, presenting findings from a region not frequently examined in this regard-Southeast Europe, specifically North Macedonia.

Abstract The COVID-19 pandemic is an international public health crisis without precedent in the last century. The novelty and rapid spread of the virus have added a new urgency to the availability and distribution of reliable information to help curb its fatal potential. As seasoned and trusted purveyors of reliable public information, librarians have attempted to respond to the “infodemic” of fake news, disinformation, and propaganda with a variety of strategies, but the COVID-19 pandemic presents a unique challenge because of the deadly stakes involved. The seriousness of the current situation requires that librarians and associated professionals re-evaluate the ethical basis of their approach to information provision to counter the growing prominence of conspiracy theories in the public sphere and official decision making. This paper analyzes the conspiracy mindset and specific COVID-19 conspiracy theories in discussing how libraries might address the problems of truth and untruth in ethically sound ways. As a contribution to the re-evaluation we propose, the paper presents an ethical framework based on alethic rights—or rights to truth—as conceived by Italian philosopher Franca D’Agostini and how these might inform professional approaches that support personal safety, open knowledge, and social justice.

With severe mistrust around classical approaches to consciousness, this paper claims that arguments around the notion of “personalization” of media or messages are grounded on a misinterpretation. Based on the two presuppositions of respective differentiation of human beings and the power to make choices based on reasoning, these approaches have been the reference for many well-known scientific studies, mainly in the fields of media studies, economics, political sciences, and psychology. Despite refuting their results via meta-analyses, such theories have so far sought to maintain their position by resorting to conspiracy theories, the promotion of which, ironically, leads to the syndrome of skepticism, which supports its origins in a vicious circle. While these approaches have been ubiquitous in so-called cognitive priming, projection of mass movements and political abuses of the concepts such as misinformation or disinformation, the mainstream workouts in the fields including but not limited to Perception Management, Artificial Intelligence, and Machine Learning have significantly relied on both de-individualistic and irrational processes. This article aims to prove that the ontological claims about the centrality of individualism in the latest fields of all media and communication technological procedures are grounded in a conspiracy theory. Relying on the method of epistemological reasoning, this article attempts to prove that individualism and personalization in the field of the media industry are the principal tools of social control through the spread of skepticism, which takes advantage of the fictitious nature of the new media sphere for commercial and political purposes.

WHO TO TRUST? Christian Belief in Conspiracy Theories by Nigel Chapman et al. Victoria, Australia: ISCAST, 2022. 164 pages. Paperback; $12.99. ISBN: 9780645067156. ebook/discussion paper. https://iscast.org/conspiracy/. *Conspiracy theories (CTs) have existed for as long as humans have been able to record them for posterity; however, due to the exponential growth of electronic media, the proliferation and popularity of CTs have made them ubiquitous. Western societies have been particularly affected by CTs in recent decades through our ability to communicate unfiltered diatribes at the speed of light, by the seductive influence of CTs as a form of mass entertainment, and by unabashed populists who use them to tar their political rivals. Though they still frequently draw ridicule, conspiracy claims are now a mainstream form of grievance, spread by people--rich, poor, weak, and powerful--across the political spectrum. This is largely why academics in the behavioral and social sciences, concerned by the harmful impact of CTs on public discourse and social behavior, have begun to treat them and the people who promote them as objects of serious study. *Sadly, committed Christians are no strangers to the conspiracy mindset, and not only those who belong to fringe communities obsessed with end-times prophecy and creeping authoritarianism. Hence, learning to identify the common elements of conspiracist thinking and guarding themselves, their relationships, and their faith communities against its corrosive influence, is a timely and urgent issue for those who claim to be followers of Christ. *This short book (or long "discussion paper," as its authors describe it) is the product of fifteen science and theology authors who are committed Christians and associates of the Institute for the Study of Christianity in an Age of Science and Technology (ISCAST), an Australian organization that promotes dialogue on the intersection of faith and science. The central goal of this work is to harmonize the academic research on conspiracy thinking with biblical ethics in order to help Christian leaders and their communities address the phenomenon of conspiracism in a socially constructive and spiritually uplifting manner. *The book contains five main chapters--two of a theoretical nature and three of a practical nature. The first two summarize the ideas of leading academics (Barkun, Brotherton, Douglas, Dyrendal, Uscinski and Parent, van Prooijen, etc.), with a special focus on political polarization and populism, and the ways these shape, or are shaped by, conspiracy theories. The third chapter examines popular vaccine and COVID-19-themed conspiracy theories in Australia, North America, and Europe, and it highlights the exaggerated suspicions many Christians harbor toward government, media, academia, and other mainstream epistemic authorities. The last two chapters discuss the ethical, psycho-social, and organizational challenges that conspiracism poses on the way Christians live and think, admonishing them--as individuals and faith communities--to examine conspiracy claims in an epistemically responsible, socially constructive, and biblically grounded manner. *This book presents several strong arguments. First, because some conspiracy claims turn out to be true (Watergate, Iran-Contra, etc.), there is need to exercise careful discernment, engage in charitable exchanges, and consult appropriate expert sources when considering the credibility of specific CT claims. Real conspiracies generally turn out to be less ambitious in scope than the more elaborate theories that flourish in alternative media (JFK, "deep state," flat earth, deadly vaccines, etc.) and are usually the product of organized criminal networks, political graft, or fraudulent business deals. *Second, implausible CTs are often promoted by fringe media, non-experts, and subversive political movements, all of whom habitually traffic in speculation rather than hard evidence, blame vague or invisible enemies who cannot be prosecuted, berate official narratives rather than present a consistent counter-theory, ask rhetorical questions that invite the hearer to distrust experts, and make bombastic claims that reinforce anxieties of impending doom, furtive enemies, secret patterns hiding in plain sight, social marginalization, and political alienation. *Third, CTs negatively affect social relations by "building isolation, paranoia, anxiety, or depression in some individuals, [...] splitting friends, families, churches," disrupting communities, and "undermining [legal, political, and academic] institutions through cynicism and mistrust" (p. 6). Not only is the impact of strong conspiracy beliefs detrimental to healthy social relationships and responsible citizenship, CTs also undermine the New Testament's instructions not to slander, not to proffer angry judgments and insults, nor to engage in strife and partiality but rather to live in harmony, love, respect, patience, and forbearance in accordance with Christ's example. *Fourth, these considerations should lead Christians who feel drawn to conspiracist explanations to exercise humility in their search for truth, and to nurture a predisposition to healing rather than attacking relationships and institutions. "A Christian conspiracy theorist should understand themselves to be seeking truth and justice" (p. 6), cultivating awareness of the biases and self-victimizing tendencies that especially affect Christians (e.g., through divisive biblical and pseudo-biblical doctrines), and fostering dialogue rather than fractious debate. "Conspiracy theories may be true or false. But if we want to avoid spreading untruths, injustices, and strife, then we must cultivate a reasonable and peaceable impartiality in the way that we assess or discuss them" (p. 114). *Finally, "inoculation is better than cure" (p. 131). By sensitizing believers to the challenges of cognitive biases and disinformation, we can help them guard their hearts and minds against disruptive CTs and the unhealthy behaviors they elicit. "We should train Christians to hear diverse views; have good conversations; debate ideas; hear from Christians who work as experts or authorities in public life; demand consistent democratic values in public life; and have the emotional maturity to be generous in spirit toward their opponents (p. 6)." *This book/discussion paper serves as a useful and well-rounded survey of academic literature on conspiracism and as a primer for practical discussions on trust, responsible research, and Christian ethics. It contains useful definitions, summaries, and suggestions for further reading that make the text easy to read and to follow. Its language is accessible to most, though its content is less balanced in its accessibility to a mass audience. The information presented in the first two chapters may be complex to those with little knowledge of psychology and political science, while the second half, strong in biblical references, requires the reader to have some level of familiarity with the scriptures and (it goes without saying) a belief in their moral authority. Inversely, well-versed readers may find that the overview presented in the first half of the work lacks depth of analysis. Readers will also notice a lack of cohesion (and some repetition) between chapters, but this is unsurprising in a 163-page discussion paper written by fifteen authors divided into four working groups. Like the old adage that a giraffe is a racehorse designed by a committee, so too does this work end up lacking some unity. Nevertheless, it still serves as a useful guide for church leaders seeking greater theoretical and/or practical understanding of conspiracy thinking, and for small groups wishing to improve communications, counselling services, and ministry to the politically and socially disaffected within their church or wider community. *If we reformulate the title of this text to "Whom Should Christians Trust?," and distill it through the clichéd but effective rhetorical question "What would Jesus do?," we might then ask ourselves, "Whom would Jesus fear?" The answer to this question, of course, is "no one," because his kingdom is not of this world. This maxim encapsulates the central message of this discussion paper, which admonishes its readers not to fall prey to worldly anxieties but to have--and to guide others toward--the confidence that Christ has already won the battle against all evil plots. His followers need only guard their hearts against despair and pursue the truth with love. *Reviewed by Michel Jacques Gagné, a historian, podcaster, and the author of Thinking Critically about the Kennedy Assassination: Debunking the Myths and Conspiracy Theories (Routledge, 2022). He teaches courses in critical thinking, political philosophy, and ethics at Champlain College, St. Lambert, QC.

We explore the common attributes of political conflicts in which scientific findings have a central role, using the COVID-19 pandemic as a case study, but also drawing on long-standing conflicts over climate change and vaccinations. We analyze situations in which the systematic spread of disinformation or conspiracy theories undermines public trust in the work of scientists and prevents policy from being informed by the best available evidence. We also examine instances in which public opposition to scientifically grounded policy arises from legitimate value judgments and lived experience. We argue for the public benefit of quick identification of politically motivated science denial, and inoculation of the public against its ill effects.

Vaccination in light of the COVID-19 pandemic is a hot topic in scientific and popular circles. The article presents the adaptation and validation of the questionnaire measuring the propensity to believe in conspiracy theories regarding vaccination (Vaccine Conspiracy Beliefs Scale). The questionnaire consists of 7 statements with 7 response categories in the Likert scale. The work includes translation and adaptation for the Russian sample of the Englishlanguage version of the questionnaire, including forward and backward translation as well as the use of cognitive laboratories. The translation was carried out by three experts, followed by the finalization of the questionnaire version for quantitative analysis. The cognitive laboratory tested how clear the translation and the investigated construct were for respondents. Data analysis was conducted within the framework of modern testing theory using models from Rasch modeling. The sample consisted of 308 students from Russian universities (average age 20.6 years; SD = 3.9). The quantitative analysis showed satisfactory psychometric characteristics of the questionnaire. A deeper analysis revealed that the sample is divided into two latent classes according to the response style of the test takers. The response style is a specific characteristic of the test-taker, which makes it possible to closer examine the reasons why the testtaker has chosen one or another response option. The study of response styles is an underrepresented area in domestic research and the article contributes to the development of this area while also emphasizing the need to study response styles when using questionnaires. Overall, the article details the methodology for validating measurement tools in the social sciences.

AbstractIn the social sciences, research on conspiracy theories is accumulating fast. To contribute to this research, here I introduce a computational model about the psychological processes underlying support for conspiracy theories. The proposal is that endorsement of these theories depends on three factors: prior beliefs, novel evidence, and expected consequences. Thanks to the latter, a conspiracy hypothesis might be selected because it is the costliest to reject even if it is not the best supported by evidence and by prior beliefs (i.e., even if it is not the most accurate). In this way, the model implies a key role for motivated reasoning. By examining the social conditions that favour the success of conspiracy theories, the paper embeds the model, whose focus is primarily psychological, within the broader social context, and applies this analysis to probe the role of conspiracy theories within contemporary Western societies. Altogether, the paper argues that a computational outlook can contribute to elucidate the socio-psychological dynamics underlying the attractiveness of conspiracy theories.

AbstractConspiracy theories and conspiracy theorists have been accused of a great many sins, but are the conspiracy theories conspiracy theorists believe epistemically problematic? Well, according to some recent work (such as Cassam Quassim, Keith Harris, and M. Guilia Napolitano), yes, they are. Yet a number of other philosophers (myself included) like Brian L. Keeley, Charles Pigden, Kurtis Hagen, Lee Basham, and the like have argued ‘No!’ I will argue that there are features of certain conspiracy theories which license suspicion of such theories. I will also argue that these features only license a limited suspicion of these conspiracy theories, and thus we need to be careful about generalising from such suspicions to a view of the warrant of conspiracy theories more generally. To understand why, we need to get to the bottom of what exactly makes us suspicious of certain conspiracy theories, and how being suspicious of a conspiracy theory does not always tell us anything about how likely the theory in question is to be false.

AbstractCurrent thinking about conspiracy theories is dominated by epistemological and psychological approaches. The former see the study of conspiracy theories as a branch of epistemology and insist that each theory should be judged on its evidential merits. On this account, a conspiracy theory is an explanation of an event which cites a conspiracy as a salient cause. Psychological approaches explain belief in conspiracy theories by reference to individual personality traits and generic cognitive biases. Despite their popularity, both epistemological and psychological approaches are flawed. After identifying their flaws, a case is made for a different perspective which focuses on the political function of conspiracy theories. A conspiracy theory is not just an explanation of an event which cites a conspiracy as a salient cause. Conspiracy theories have a range of additional features which distinguish them from ordinary theories about conspiracies and make them unlikely to be true. The political approach sees many conspiracy theories as forms of political propaganda and is especially mindful of the role of conspiracy theories in promoting extremist ideologies.

AbstractSocial media use occupies a prominent space in social sciences scholarship and beyond. However, the distinction between active and passive use of social media, although important in explaining a variety of users’ behaviours, has been overlooked in terms of its potential to predict key socially relevant outcomes like beliefs in conspiracy theories. In three studies (N = 1388, in total), we provide evidence on (a) the role of passive social media use in believing in conspiracy theories via personal relative deprivation; (b) the interaction effect between social media use and personal relative deprivation on beliefs in conspiracy theories. The results showed that passive social media use is linked to, and increases, beliefs in conspiracy theories and this relationship is partially mediated via increased personal relative deprivation (Studies 1 and 2). In Study 3, personal relative deprivation was also manipulated experimentally in the context of a ʻmoderation‐of‐process' design, yielding a significant interaction with social media use. The results are discussed in the light of their social and media psychological contribution and implications in the digital era, when misinformation often becomes prevalent.

Belief in conspiracy theories—such as belief that the earth is flat or that 5G networks cause cancer—is relatively prominent in the United States. While emerging research has tied self-control to some patterns of deviant beliefs, such as belief in the paranormal, the extent to which self-control theory explains belief in conspiracy theories remains elusive. Given the breadth of belief in conspiracy theories, as well as the explanatory power of self-control theory for deviant behaviors more generally, this limitation is surprising. Using a sample of 1,231 college students, we examine the link between self-control and conspiracy beliefs. Results show that self-control is a significant indicator of belief in conspiracy theories, even after controlling for key correlates of belief. Overall, findings suggest that characteristics of low self-control promote higher endorsement of conspiracy beliefs.

Conspiracy theories continue to threaten individuals, groups, and social institutions. They are easily spread through social media and are attractive to many in society. These theories commonly target perceived dangers to those in power and, thus, can undermine both social justice and human rights. Consequently, social work—with its focus on social justice and the person-in-environment framing—must assume a proactive role in dealing with these theories, which includes interventions at many different levels of practice beginning with education. Social work’s goal of achieving inclusive, diverse, and equitable societies demands that the profession assume an active role in challenging these theories.