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Selection bias in supporters of the coronavirus conspiracy theory

Friday, May 28, 2021

psychology

Selection bias in supporters of the coronavirus conspiracy theory

Coronavirus conspiracy beliefs in the German-speaking general population: support and links to inferential bias and paranoia

A significant proportion of the sample recruited in Germany and German-speaking Switzerland strongly or somewhat supported the belief in a coronavirus conspiracy. These beliefs are related to inference biases studied in delusional research. The non-probability sampling approach limits the generalizability of the findings. Future longitudinal and experimental studies that investigate conspiracy beliefs along lines of inference are encouraged to examine inference anomalies as risk factors.

DOI: https: //doi.org/10.1017/S0033291721001124

Commentary

This study evaluated coronavirus-related conspiracy theories (CT) and cognitive factors. The sample consisted of a German-speaking general population, and the study was designed to obtain initial estimates of support for coronavirus-related conspiracy beliefs and to investigate whether delusion-related inferential biases and delusional ideation are associated with such beliefs. The subjects were 1684 adults from Germany and German-speaking Switzerland, and a cross-sectional, non-probability online survey had been conducted.

As a result, about 10% of these samples strongly supported the coronavirus-related conspiracy theory, and about 20% supported the conspiracy theory to some extent. Those with a higher level of support for conspiracy beliefs were found to have a greater jumping to conclusions bias (JTC), a greater liberal acceptance bias (LA), a greater bias against negative evidence (BADE), a greater likelihood of misunderstanding (PM), and were associated with greater paranoid ideation, but However, most of these associations are small to moderate and are best explained by nonlinear relationships.

People with these larger biases tended to be younger, had lower levels of education, were more politically biased, and did not differ by gender.

Limitations of this study include a cross-sectional design that prohibits drawing causal inferences about the relationship between inference bias or paranoia and conspiracy beliefs, examining inference bias as a correlate rather than a risk factor, not ruling out the possibility of selection bias of any type, and assigning continuously assessed scores to categories on a Likert scale. A posteriori assignment to categories may have yielded slightly different results than other studies that used ordinal scales from the beginning, so we should not assume that conspiracy theory supporters are necessarily prone to this.

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