Popular epistemically unwarranted beliefs inventory (PEUBI): A psychometric instrument for assessing paranormal, pseudoscientific and conspiracy beliefs

Abstract

Studying epistemically unwarranted beliefs (EUB) is relevant at basic, applied, and social levels. However, EUB scales validated in Spain are scare. Consequently, we aimed to develop and validate a scale of this kind. One thousand four hundred and sixty participants answered to a preliminary version of the questionnaire. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses revealed the final form of PEUBI: a 36-item instrument with five related factors (Superstitions, Occultism and Pseudoscience, Traditional Religion, Extraordinary Life Forms, and Conspiracy Theories). The results showed that the items were little affected by social desirability bias. PEUBI factor scores showed good internal consistency (estimates between .85 and .97), testretest reliability (estimates between .75 and .93), and convergent-divergent validity.Sociodemographic differences were also explored, observing lower levels of EUB in men, elders, from pure sciences and technology, and atheists. In conclusion, PEUBI is a valid and reliable psychometric instrument to assess paranormal, pseudoscientific and conspiracy beliefs in Spanish adults.

A validation of the Pseudoscience Endorsement Scale and assessment of the cognitive correlates of pseudoscientific beliefs

“…Our first goal was to validate this scale and to study the relationship between the presence of pseudoscientific beliefs and of other unwarranted beliefs. Following previous studies (Lobato et al, 2014;Fasce and Picó, 2019;Majima, 2015;Torres et al, 2020;Huete-Pérez et al, 2022), our hypothesis is that, despite possible conceptual and distributional differences (see below), endorsement of pseudoscientific beliefs positively correlates with the presence of other types of unwarranted beliefs (i.e., paranormal beliefs, science denialism and conspiracist beliefs).…”

“…In the present study, we revised and translated into English the Pseudoscience Endorsement Scale (PES), originally created by Torres et al (2020) in Spanish. Unlike other questionnaires, which intermingle different types of unjustified beliefs (Lobato et al, 2014;Majima, 2015;Fasce and Picó, 2019;Huete-Pérez et al, 2022), include assessments of scientific knowledge (Johnson and Pigliucci, 2004;Losh and Nzekwe, 2011), or are exclusively addressed to evaluate the use of complementary and alternative medicine (Astin, 1998;Lindeman, 2011), the PES focuses only on the endorsement of pseudoscientific beliefs, thus avoiding other possible confounding variables, but encompasses the variety of pseudoscientific myths and beliefs about pseudotherapies that proliferate in nowadays society.…”

Individual differences in visual word recognition: the role of epistemically unwarranted beliefs on affective processing and signal detection

“…Data analysis 2.4.1. Epistemically unwarranted beliefs scores PEUBI offers the possibility of using both factor scores and the sum of raw scores (Huete-Pérez et al, 2022). In this case, we chose to use the sum of raw scores, that is, we added the scores of all the items of each factor (reverse scored items: 2, 5, 8, 11, 12, 14, 16, 25, 27, 28, 30 and 33).…”

“…EUB is a term used to refer to socially widespread claims that are not supported enough by either reliable empirical evidence or valid reasoning (Dyer & Hall, 2019), and it encompasses the paranormal (e.g., the existence of ghosts), 2 pseudoscience (e.g., complementary and alternative medicine of unproven efficacy) and conspiracy theories (e.g., Hitler did not die in 1945, but escaped and continued to live under a secret identity) (Lobato et al, 2014;Rizeq et al, 2020). These kinds of beliefs are not residual, but common in the general population (see Huete-Pérez et al, 2022). Therefore, study samples can easily vary in the distribution of these beliefs.…”

“…2.3.3. Popular Epistemically Unwarranted Beliefs Inventory (PEUBI)Developed byHuete-Pérez et al (2022), this inventory assesses five correlated dimensions of EUB [Superstitions (PEUBI-S), Occultism and Pseudoscience (PEUBI-OP), Traditional Religion (PEUBI-TR), Extraordinary Life Forms (PEUBI-ELF) and Conspiracy Theories (PEUBI-CT)] through 36 items on a 5-point scale (1 = Fully disagree, 5 = Fully agree).…”