Recursive Fury: Conspiracist Ideation in the Blogosphere in Response to Research on Conspiracist Ideation

130

131

Conspiracy theories (CTs) can take many forms and vary widely in popularity, the intensity with which they are believed and their effects on individual and collective behavior. An integrated account of CTs thus needs to explain how they come to appeal to potential believers, how they spread from one person to the next via communication, and how they motivate collective action. We summarize these aspects under the labels of stick, spread, and action. We propose the quasi-religious hypothesis for CTs: drawing on cognitive science of religion, social representations theory, and frame theory. We use cognitive science of religion to describe the main features of the content of CTs that explain how they come to stick: CTs are quasi-religious representations in that their contents, forms and functions parallel those found in beliefs of institutionalized religions. However, CTs are quasi-religious in that CTs and the communities that support them, lack many of the institutional features of organized religions. We use social representations theory to explain how CTs spread as devices for making sense of sudden events that threaten existing worldviews. CTs allow laypersons to interpret such events by relating them to common sense, thereby defusing some of the anxiety that those events generate. We use frame theory to explain how some, but not all CTs mobilize collective counter-conspiratorial action by identifying a target and by proposing credible and concrete rationales for action. We specify our integrated account in 13 propositions.

Section: Explaining Ct Stickiness: Cognitive Science Of Religionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Conspiracy theories as quasi-religious mentality: an integrated account from cognitive science, social representations theory, and frame theory

Franks¹,

Bangerter²,

Bauer³

2013

130

131

“…The predominant paradigm of psychological research in the field of conspiracy theories assumes that a clear distinction between an official truth and delusive idiosyncratic explanations can be made. For instance, Lewandowsky et al (2013) showed that taking the moon landing for a hoax is correlated with a disbelief in climate change and a rejection of the fact that smoking causes lung cancer. One can either believe that smoking causes lung cancer, or one might not.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Apart from some recent studies—e.g., Sapountzis and Condor (2013) have evaluated the spontaneous use of conspiracy narratives in interviews of Greek citizens and Lewandowsky et al (2013) investigated conspiracist ideation in the blogosphere—most studies have focused on the recipients of conspiracy theories using questionnaires and drawing an artificial red line between believers and disbelievers. To our understanding, this approach reveals some misleading basic assumptions about conspiracy theories: (a) Conspiracy theories are treated as invariant entities (b) that can be reduced to single statements and (c) that recipients of conspiracy theories can be regarded as passive consumers and (d) that believers are always believers independently from the “quality” of the regarding storyline.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Thirty shades of truth: conspiracy theories as stories of individuation, not of pathological delusion

Raab¹,

Ortlieb²,

Auer³

et al. 2013

Recent studies on conspiracy theories employ standardized questionnaires, thus neglecting their narrative qualities by reducing them to mere statements. Recipients are considered as consumers only. Two empirical studies—a conventional survey (n = 63) and a study using the method of narrative construction (n = 30)—which were recently conducted by the authors of this paper—suggest that the truth about conspiracy theories is more complex. Given a set of statements about a dramatic historic event (in our case 9/11) that includes official testimonies, allegations to a conspiracy and extremely conspiratorial statements, the majority of participants created a narrative of 9/11 they deemed plausible that might be considered a conspiracy theory. The resulting 30 idiosyncratic stories imply that no clear distinction between official story and conspiratorial narrative is possible any more when the common approach of questionnaires is abandoned. Based on these findings, we present a new theoretical and methodological approach which acknowledges conspiracy theories as a means of constructing and communicating a set of personal values. While broadening the view upon such theories, we stay compatible with other approaches that have focused on extreme theory types. In our view, accepting conspiracy theories as a common, regulative and possibly benign phenomenon, we will be better able to understand why some people cling to immunized, racist and off-wall stories—and others do not.

“…Barnum) offer “something for everyone”; so everybody is free to adopt some story fragments only. As we have no further information about and control of the regarding creators, proliferators and consumers of such content we need methods—in addition to content analysis (e.g., Lewandowsky et al, 2013a), interviews (e.g., Sapountzis and Condor, 2013) and standardized questionnaires (e.g., Lewandowsky et al, 2013b)—which allow for the dynamic character of compiling, reframing and linking of information to unfold.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Sarrazin effect: the presence of absurd statements in conspiracy theories makes canonical information less plausible

Raab¹,

Auer²,

Ortlieb³

et al. 2013

Reptile prime ministers and flying Nazi saucers—extreme and sometimes off-wall conclusion are typical ingredients of conspiracy theories. While individual differences are a common research topic concerning conspiracy theories, the role of extreme statements in the process of acquiring and passing on conspiratorial stories has not been regarded in an experimental design so far. We identified six morphological components of conspiracy theories empirically. On the basis of these content categories a set of narrative elements for a 9/11 story was compiled. These elements varied systematically in terms of conspiratorial allegation, i.e., they contained official statements concerning the events of 9/11, statements alleging to a conspiracy limited in time and space as well as extreme statements indicating an all-encompassing cover-up. Using the method of narrative construction, 30 people were given a set of cards with these statements and asked to construct the course of events of 9/11 they deem most plausible. When extreme statements were present in the set, the resulting stories were more conspiratorial; the number of official statements included in the narrative dropped significantly, whereas the self-assessment of the story's plausibility did not differ between conditions. This indicates that blatant statements in a pool of information foster the synthesis of conspiracy theories on an individual level. By relating these findings to one of Germany's most successful (and controversial) non-fiction books, we refer to the real-world dangers of this effect.