Conspiracy thinking is only dangerous when it mixes with extreme partisanship

Conspiracy theories about American politics are nothing new, but recent months have seen an upswing in their impact, after pipe bombs were mailed by a conspiracy theorist to high-profile figures with links to the Democratic Party. Adam M. Enders and Steven M. Smallpage write that conspiracy thinking is not dangerous in and of itself: most Americans have a tendency to be suspicious. But problems arise, they argue, when this conspiratorial thinking is activated by extreme political partisanship and polarization. People then begin to buy into conspiracy theories aimed at the opposing party, which can in turn lead them to take often violent actions

The impact of social desirability bias on conspiracy belief measurement across cultures

Polls asking respondents about their beliefs in conspiracy theories have become increasingly commonplace. However, researchers have expressed concern about the willingness of respondents to divulge beliefs in conspiracy theories due to the stigmatization of those ideas. We use an experimental design similar to a list experiment to decipher the effect of social desirability bias on survey responses to eight conspiratorial statements. Our study includes 8290 respondents across seven countries, allowing for the examination of social desirability bias across various political and cultural contexts. While the proportion of individuals expressing belief in each statement varies across countries, we observe identical treatment effects: respondents systematically underreport conspiracy beliefs. These findings suggest that conspiracy beliefs may be more prominent than current estimates suggest

The dark side of social movements: Social identity, non-conformity, and the lure of conspiracy theories

Social change does not always equal social progress--there is a dark side of social movements. We discuss conspiracy theory beliefs –beliefs that a powerful group of people are secretly working towards a malicious goal–as one contributor to destructive social movements. Research has linked conspiracy theory beliefs to anti-democratic attitudes, prejudice and non-normative political behavior. We propose a framework to understand the motivational processes behind conspiracy theories and associated social identities and collective action. We argue that conspiracy theories comprise at least two components – content and qualities— that appeal to people differently based on their motivations. Social identity motives draw people foremost to contents of conspiracy theories while uniqueness motives draw people to qualities of conspiracy theories

Replication Data for: "The Partisan Contours of Conspiracy Theory Beliefs"

This is the replication data for the paper published in Research and Politics titled, "The Partisan Contours of Conspiracy Theory Beliefs.

On the Measurement of Conspiracy Beliefs

This page contains the files necessary to replicate the findings presented in "On the Measurement of Conspiracy Beliefs," by Adam M. Enders and Steven M. Smallpage. We recommend that you begin you exploration of this material by reading the file entitled README

On the measurement of conspiracy beliefs

Are so-called “birthers” best thought of as true conspiracy theorists, or are they merely partisans expressing a sharp dislike of Barack Obama? Recent work on conspiracy beliefs finds that “birthers” are the product of partisan and ideological motivated reasoning. In this manuscript, we explore how the measurement strategies we employ on public opinion surveys may influence the substantive conclusions we draw about conspiratorial beliefs, rumors, and misinformation. We find that partisan stimuli influence reported beliefs in several different conspiracy theories, and, subsequently, the relationships between individual stated beliefs in those conspiracy theories. The implications of these findings are discussed

Replication data for: "Are All 'Birthers' Conspiracy Theorists?: On the Relationship Between Conspiratorial Thinking and Political Orientations"

These are the replication files for the paper entitled, "Are All 'Birthers' Conspiracy Theorists?: On the Relationship Between Conspiratorial Thinking and Political Orientations," by Adam M. Enders, Steven M. Smallpage, and Robert N. Lupton. Interested readers should begin their exploration of the data by reading the "README" file, which explains all other files in the dataset

“They've conspired against us”: Understanding the role of social identification and conspiracy beliefs in justification of ingroup collective behavior

The present research investigates conditions under which beliefs in conspiracy theories predict the desire to justify ingroup behavior in the context of intergroup conflict. We propose that within the context of Ukraine's intergroup conflict over the annexation of Crimea, supporters (but not opponents) of the “Euromaidan” social movement are likely to validate protesters’ collective actions as just to the extent that they believe that the authorities are engaged in annexation‐related conspiracies. We also examine the moderating role of perceived political corruption in these processes. Using a public opinion survey of 315 Ukrainians, we found support for our hypothesized moderated mediation model—identification with “Euromaidan” increased beliefs in the annexation‐related conspiracy theories, which in turn, increased justification of protesters’ actions in the setting of intergroup conflict. However, this mediation was only observed among those supporters of the Euromaidan who perceived political corruption to be at a low or average level