Belief in U.S. Government Conspiracies Against Blacks among Black and White College Students: Powerlessness or System Blame?

Abstract

Black Americans are far more likely than White Americans to endorse theories about conspiracies by the U.S. government against Blacks. The present study explored the predictors of these conspiracy beliefs for 91 Black and 96 White college students. Two explanations for belief in these conspiracies were considered, one focusing on political powerless and externality of attributions and the other focusing on system blame for Blacks’ disadvantaged status. Regression analyses supported the view that belief in these conspiracy theories is related to blaming problems of Black Americans on prejudice and discrimination. Race was a powerful predictor of belief in these conspiracies even when socioeconomic status was controlled. Furthermore, the race effect was partially mediated by the system blame measure but not by political powerlessness or greater externality of attributional style. System blame was a much stronger predictor of conspiracy beliefs for Black than for White students. Conspiracy beliefs were positively associated with the racial self-esteem of Black students and negatively for White students. Clinical implications and implications for intergroup relations are discussed.

Does Self-Love or Self-Hate Predict Conspiracy Beliefs? Narcissism, Self-Esteem, and the Endorsement of Conspiracy Theories

“…Low self-esteem was only a marginally significant predictor of various conspiracy beliefs in the study by Abalkina-Paap and colleagues (1999). In other studies, low self-esteem significantly predicted endorsement of some conspiracy theories (e.g., concerning the London bombings of July 7, 2005, Swami RUNNING HEAD: Narcissism and conspiracy beliefs 4 et al, 2011; see also Swami & Furnham, 2012) but not others (e.g., concerning conspiratorial actions of Jews, Swami, 2012; see also Crocker et al, 1999;Stieger, Gumhalter, Tran, Voracek, & Swami, 2013). Similarly, general conspiracist ideation was negatively correlated with self-esteem in a study by Stieger and colleagues (2013; although the correlation was significant only in the first wave of measurement) but this relationship was weaker and nonsignificant in a study by Swami (2012).…”

‘They will not control us’: Ingroup positivity and belief in intergroup conspiracies

“…Preliminary evidence suggests that this indeed may be the case. Conspiracy beliefs are more prevalent among members of societally disadvantaged groups (Abalkina- Paap et al, 1999;Crocker, Luhtanen, Broadnax, & Blaine, 1999;Goertzel, 1994). For example, in a study conducted by Crocker and colleagues (1999), Black Americans were more likely to believe in U.S. government conspiracies against Blacks than White Americans.…”

The role of social identification, intergroup threat, and out-group derogation in explaining belief in conspiracy theory about terrorism in Indonesia

“…On another side, Moslem countries have the comparative lack of advanced technological and economic resources compared to Western countries (Hunter & Malik, 2005), and many people from Moslem countries tend to respond to such situation with fatalism, simply as a feeling of powerlessness (Acevedo, 2008). Powerlessness itself has been found as a significant determinant of conspiracy belief and thinking (Crocker et al, 1999). Taken together, it may be due to the combination of perceived intergroup threat and powerlessness or lack of resources The role of social identification, intergroup threat, and out-group derogation in explaining belief…”

“…These multiple conspiring actors are so often particularly connected to legitimate power holders or institutions in society (Robins & Post, 1997;van Prooijen & Jostmann, 2013). On one side, in explaining belief in conspiracy theory, there are well-documented literatures that have examined the effect of personal factors such as political powerlessness, attribution, and self-esteem (Crocker, Broadnax, & Blaine, 1999), big five personality (Swami, Chamorro-Premuzic, & Furnham, 2010), right-wing authoritarianism (Grzesiak-Feldman & Irzycka, 2009), anomie, locus of control, and hostility (Abalakina-Paap, Stephan, Craig, & Gregory, 1999). On another side, however, empirical studies on inter-group factors of conspiracy theory are still relatively unexplored.…”