IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/wly/amposc/v60y2016i4p824-844.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Conspiracy Endorsement as Motivated Reasoning: The Moderating Roles of Political Knowledge and Trust

Author

Listed:
  • Joanne M. Miller
  • Kyle L. Saunders
  • Christina E. Farhart

Abstract

Given the potential political and social significance of conspiracy beliefs, a substantial and growing body of work examines the individual‐level correlates of belief in conspiracy theories and general conspiratorial predispositions. However, although we know much about the psychological antecedents of conspiracy endorsement, we know less about the individual‐level political causes of these prevalent and consequential beliefs. Our work draws from the extant literature to posit that endorsement of conspiracy theories is a motivated process that serves both ideological and psychological needs. In doing so, we develop a theory that identifies a particular type of person—one who is both highly knowledgeable about politics and lacking in trust—who is most susceptible to ideologically motivated conspiracy endorsement. Further, we demonstrate that the moderators of belief in conspiracy theories are strikingly different for conservatives and liberals.

Suggested Citation

  • Joanne M. Miller & Kyle L. Saunders & Christina E. Farhart, 2016. "Conspiracy Endorsement as Motivated Reasoning: The Moderating Roles of Political Knowledge and Trust," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 60(4), pages 824-844, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:wly:amposc:v:60:y:2016:i:4:p:824-844
    DOI: 10.1111/ajps.12234
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/ajps.12234
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/ajps.12234?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Casey A. Klofstad & Joseph E. Uscinski & Jennifer M. Connolly & Jonathan P. West, 2019. "What drives people to believe in Zika conspiracy theories?," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 5(1), pages 1-8, December.
    2. Van Oost, Pascaline & Yzerbyt, Vincent & Schmitz, Mathias & Vansteenkiste, Maarten & Luminet, Olivier & Morbée, Sofie & Van den Bergh, Omer & Waterschoot, Joachim & Klein, Olivier, 2022. "The relation between conspiracism, government trust, and COVID-19 vaccination intentions: The key role of motivation," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 301(C).
    3. Oliver Fernando Hidalgo, 2022. "Religions and Conspiracy Theories as the Authoritarian “Other” of Democracy?," Politics and Governance, Cogitatio Press, vol. 10(4), pages 146-156.
    4. Erik Peterson & Shanto Iyengar, 2021. "Partisan Gaps in Political Information and Information‐Seeking Behavior: Motivated Reasoning or Cheerleading?," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 65(1), pages 133-147, January.
    5. Daniel Silverman, 2019. "What Shapes Civilian Beliefs about Violent Events? Experimental Evidence from Pakistan," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 63(6), pages 1460-1487, July.
    6. Bernd Schlipphak & Mujtaba Isani & Mitja D. Back, 2022. "Conspiracy Theory Beliefs and Political Trust: The Moderating Role of Political Communication," Politics and Governance, Cogitatio Press, vol. 10(4), pages 157-167.
    7. Nefes, Türkay Salim & Präg, Patrick & Romero-Reche, Alejandro & Pereira-Puga, Manuel, 2023. "Believing in conspiracy theories in Spain during the COVID-19 pandemic: Drivers and public health implications," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 336(C).
    8. Adrian Kwek & Luke Peh & Josef Tan & Jin Xing Lee, 2023. "Distractions, analytical thinking and falling for fake news: A survey of psychological factors," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 10(1), pages 1-12, December.
    9. Milošević Đorđević, J. & Mari, S. & Vdović, M. & Milošević, A., 2021. "Links between conspiracy beliefs, vaccine knowledge, and trust: Anti-vaccine behavior of Serbian adults," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 277(C).
    10. Michael Hannon, 2022. "Are knowledgeable voters better voters?," Politics, Philosophy & Economics, , vol. 21(1), pages 29-54, February.
    11. Laura Colautti & Alice Cancer & Sara Magenes & Alessandro Antonietti & Paola Iannello, 2022. "Risk-Perception Change Associated with COVID-19 Vaccine’s Side Effects: The Role of Individual Differences," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(3), pages 1-14, January.
    12. Jaesun Wang & Seoyong Kim, 2021. "The Paradox of Conspiracy Theory: The Positive Impact of Beliefs in Conspiracy Theories on Preventive Actions and Vaccination Intentions during the COVID-19 Pandemic," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(22), pages 1-27, November.
    13. Motta, Matt & Benegal, Salil D, 2022. "How Pandemic-Related Changes in Global Attitudes Toward the Scientific Community Shape “Post-Pandemic” Environmental Opinion," SocArXiv v9egn, Center for Open Science.
    14. Seoyong Kim & Sunhee Kim, 2020. "Searching for General Model of Conspiracy Theories and Its Implication for Public Health Policy: Analysis of the Impacts of Political, Psychological, Structural Factors on Conspiracy Beliefs about the," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(1), pages 1-28, December.
    15. R Kelly Garrett & Brian E Weeks, 2017. "Epistemic beliefs’ role in promoting misperceptions and conspiracist ideation," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 12(9), pages 1-17, September.
    16. Callaghan, Timothy & Motta, Matthew & Sylvester, Steven & Lunz Trujillo, Kristin & Blackburn, Christine Crudo, 2019. "Parent psychology and the decision to delay childhood vaccination," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 238(C), pages 1-1.
    17. Bartosz M. Nowak & Cezary Miedziarek & Szymon Pełczyński & Piotr Rzymski, 2021. "Misinformation, Fears and Adherence to Preventive Measures during the Early Phase of COVID-19 Pandemic: A Cross-Sectional Study in Poland," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(22), pages 1-11, November.
    18. Ethan Struby & Christina Farhart, 2024. "Inflation Expectations and Political Polarization: Evidence from the Cooperative Election Study," Working Papers 2024-01, Carleton College, Department of Economics.
    19. Motta, Matthew & Callaghan, Timothy & Sylvester, Steven, 2018. "Knowing less but presuming more: Dunning-Kruger effects and the endorsement of anti-vaccine policy attitudes," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 211(C), pages 274-281.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:wly:amposc:v:60:y:2016:i:4:p:824-844. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://doi.org/10.1111/(ISSN)1540-5907 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.