The label 'conspiracy theory', while part of everyday media discourse, is considered by many as problematic. In this research, we posit that there exists diverging social representations associated with this label and that their relative endorsement is a function of preexisting beliefs. To evaluate this possibility, we examine how generic conspiracist beliefs are associated with two forms of rejection of the label: 1) Belief in a meta-conspiracy theory, that is, the belief that the label 'conspiracy theory' was purposely created by the elites in order to discredit dissent, and 2) a particularist view of conspiracy theories, that is, the idea that 'conspiracy theories' are too diverse to draw any generic conclusions regarding their (ir)rationality and that the label is therefore inadequate. Across two studies (Ns = 1297), using principal components (Study 1) and confirmatory factor analyses (Study 2), we found that generic conspiracist beliefs and belief in meta-conspiracy theory were tightly related. Moreover, in Study 2, generic conspiracist beliefs were substantially associated with the endorsement of a particularist view of conspiracy theories. Using lexicometric analyses of open-ended questions about the origin and the perceived validity of the label, we identified four main criticisms addressed to the label: historical (real conspiracies happen), conceptual (the label has no clear definition), normative (the label has a negative connotation), and political (the label is weaponized by powerholders). By contrast, acceptance of the label was justified by arguments referring to common psychological mechanisms, as well as similar narrative and argumentative structures. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

The COVID‐19 pandemic is a crisis which called for two crucial modes of social regulation: social control and social solidarity . In the present pre‐registered study, we examine how the perceived non‐compliance with health measures relates to attitudes towards these modes of social regulation, as well as to the role played by the perception of disintegrated and disregulated society ( anomie ). Using data from an online cross‐sectional survey conducted in Belgium in April 2020 ( N = 717), results show that the causal attribution of the crisis to insufficient compliance was differentially associated with support for social control and social solidarity behaviours. Specifically, greater attribution to insufficient compliance was associated with a perceived breakdown in the social fabric (disintegration), which explained stronger support for social control and fewer solidarity‐based actions. Perceived disregulation, conversely, was associated with less support for social control and more support for social solidarity. Therefore, the perception of the pandemic and associated perceived anomie tend to polarize citizens' attitudes towards these two modes of social regulation. In this way, prosocial behaviours might be inhibited by communications that attribute the pandemic's causes to incivility. Other implications of our findings for the social psychological literature on communities' reactions to the pandemic are discussed. Please refer to the Supplementary Material section to find this article's Community and Social Impact Statement .

In a preregistered research, we examined the relationships between conspiracy mentality (i.e., the individual susceptibility to endorse conspiracy theories, Bruder et al., 2013) and trust in three actors of the COVID-19 crisis: 1) Political institutions, 2) scientific and medical institutions, and 3) the medical personnel. While the two former groups have played a direct or indirect role in decisions related to public health measures, the latter has not. We expected all these relationships to be negative and mediated by the belief that the pandemic is instrumentalized by authorities to pursue secret agendas. In a study conducted with Belgian (N = 1136) and French (N = 374) convenience samples, conspiracy mentality negatively predicted trust in political institutions, and trust in scientific and medical institutions. These relations were partly mediated by belief that the pandemic is instrumentalized by authorities. In addition, distrust in political, medical and scientific institutions were highly and positively correlated, suggesting that these groups may be viewed as part of a same supraordinate category -the "Elites". By contrast, we found a small negative relationship between conspiracy mentality and trust in the medical personnel in the Belgian sample, but not in the French sample. Trust in the medical personnel was unrelated to the belief that the pandemic is instrumentalized, and only weakly related to distrust in political institutions. This suggests that individuals with a susceptibility to believe in conspiracy theories may not have a propensity to distrust all actors involved in the management of the pandemic, but only those directly or indirectly tied to decisions pertaining to public health measures.