Document Type
Undergraduate Thesis
Publication Date
Spring 5-2022
Journal
Undergraduate Honours Theses
Abstract
Belief in conspiracy theories since 2020 resulted in widespread protests towards governments attempting to mitigate the pandemic. In times of uncertainty, it is not uncommon for conspiracy beliefs to rise in popularity. However, not everyone who finds themselves in a state of uncertainty about the future holds conspiracy beliefs. Higher analytical thinking skills and lower intuitive thinking skills have been correlated with lower acceptance of conspiracy beliefs. In an era of uncertainty, factors such as analytical thinking may provide the ability to discern conspiracy beliefs from reality. Hence, in this study, feelings of uncertainty and thinking disposition (analytical vs. intuitive) were experimentally manipulated to observe their effect on conspiracy beliefs. It was predicted that individuals in the uncertainty and intuitive thinking disposition condition would yield the highest conspiracy theory levels. No significant main effect or interaction was observed. Thus, the hypothesis was not confirmed. Implications of the study findings are discussed.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Notes
Thesis Advisor(s):
Dr. Glen Gorman