Are Republicans and Conservatives More Likely to Believe Conspiracy Theories?

Abstract

A sizable literature tracing back to Richard Hofstadter’s The Paranoid Style (1964) argues that Republicans and conservatives are more likely to believe conspiracy theories than Democrats and liberals. However, the evidence for this proposition is mixed. Since conspiracy theory beliefs are associated with dangerous orientations and behaviors, it is imperative that social scientists better understand the connection between conspiracy theories and political orientations. Employing 20 surveys of Americans from 2012 to 2021 (total n = 37,776), as well as surveys of 20 additional countries spanning six continents (total n = 26,416), we undertake an expansive investigation of the asymmetry thesis. First, we examine the relationship between beliefs in 52 conspiracy theories and both partisanship and ideology in the U.S.; this analysis is buttressed by an examination of beliefs in 11 conspiracy theories across 20 more countries. In our second test, we hold constant the content of the conspiracy theories investigated—manipulating only the partisanship of the theorized villains—to decipher whether those on the left or right are more likely to accuse political out-groups of conspiring. Finally, we inspect correlations between political orientations and the general predisposition to believe in conspiracy theories over the span of a decade. In no instance do we observe systematic evidence of a political asymmetry. Instead, the strength and direction of the relationship between political orientations and conspiricism is dependent on the characteristics of the specific conspiracy beliefs employed by researchers and the socio-political context in which those ideas are considered. Supplementary Information The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s11109-022-09812-3.

Does Incentivization Promote Sharing “True” Content Online?

“…Political ideology, which refers to our beliefs about the world and ways to achieve it (Erikson & Tedin, 2003, p. 64), may partially explain beliefs in propaganda and sharing of fake news. Existing research suggests that bottom-up psychological processes make right-leaning individuals more susceptible to conspiracies with greater severity (Enders et al, 2022).…”

Conspiracy Believers Underuse Social Information (Like Everyone Else)

“…First, we measured conspiracy mentality (with two different scales), not belief in conspiracy theories. Yet, various measures of conspiracy mentality are strongly correlated with a variety of conspiracy theories throughout time (Enders et al, 2022). Second, like most research on conspiracy beliefs, participants were recruited from the general population.…”

Expressive Responding in Support of Donald Trump: An Extended Replication of Schaffner and Luks (2018)

“…Social scientists have found large partisan differences in belief reports about factual issues among Americans (Enders et al, 2022;Flynn, 2016;Jerit & Barabas, 2012;Pennycook & Rand, 2021). For example, consider two conspiracy theories from a 2016 YouGov poll (Frankovic, 2016).…”