27 June 2024
Can conspiracy beliefs reinforce paranoid thoughts?
The relationship between conspiracy thinking and various psychological constructs is often explained causally: for instance, when someone has a low sense of control, they may grasp at conspiracy explanations to seemingly make sense of the world.
In our latest article published in Applied Psychology: Health and Well-Being, we present a series of studies demonstrating that causality should also be sought in the opposite direction. In studies conducted on Polish and British samples, we show that exposure to conspiracy theories can (at least temporarily) reinforce paranoid thoughts.
This is worth keeping in mind, as conspiracy theories are present in our lives even when we do not deliberately seek them out (e.g., in books, news, films, music).
We wholeheartedly recommend the entire article, also available on ResearchGate.
Molenda, Z., Marchlewska, M., Karakula, A., Podsiadłowski, W., Rogoza, M., Bagrowska, P., & Szczepańska, D. (2024). Thought contagion? Conspiracy beliefs boost paranoid thoughts. Applied Psychology: Health and Well-Being. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1111/aphw.12577
