Beliefs About COVID-19 in Canada, the United Kingdom, and the United States: A Novel Test of Political Polarization and Motivated Reasoning

Abstract

What are the psychological consequences of the increasingly politicized nature of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States relative to similar Western countries? In a two-wave study completed early (March) and later (December) in the pandemic, we found that polarization was greater in the United States ( N = 1,339) than in Canada ( N = 644) and the United Kingdom. ( N = 1,283). Political conservatism in the United States was strongly associated with engaging in weaker mitigation behaviors, lower COVID-19 risk perceptions, greater misperceptions, and stronger vaccination hesitancy. Although there was some evidence that cognitive sophistication was associated with increased polarization in the United States in December (but not March), cognitive sophistication was nonetheless consistently negatively correlated with misperceptions and vaccination hesitancy across time, countries, and party lines. Furthermore, COVID-19 skepticism in the United States was strongly correlated with distrust in liberal-leaning mainstream news outlets and trust in conservative-leaning news outlets, suggesting that polarization may be driven by differences in information environments.

Analytic Thinking and Political Orientation in the Corona Crisis

“…In the context of the coronavirus pandemic, initial findings confirm that analytically sophisticated individuals are less prone to believe various misinformation and pseudoscientific practices regarding coronavirus prevention and treatment, including fake news and conspiracy theories about its nature and origin (Alper et al, 2020;Čavojová et al, 2020;Erceg et al, 2020b;Pennycook et al, 2020bPennycook et al, , 2021Stanley et al, 2020;Teovanović et al, 2021). Furthermore, indicators of analytic thinking have shown to be significant and relatively strong negative predictors of various misperceptions and unfounded beliefs and knowledge about COVID-19 (Čavojová et al, 2020;Erceg et al, 2020b;Stanley et al, 2020;Swami and Barron, 2020;Pennycook et al, 2021). Overall, described patterns of associations between analytic thinking, conspiracy beliefs, and COVID-19 protective behavior further suggest the possibility of endorsement of conspiracy beliefs mediating the negative relation between analytic thinking and responsible behavior.…”

“…With regard to the indicators of analytic thinking, the presence of contaminated conspiratorial mindware has been shown to correlate negatively (weak to moderate correlations) with cognitive reflection (Stanovich et al, 2016;Van Prooijen, 2017;Pennycook et al, 2020a) and open-mindedness (Swami et al, 2014;Stanovich et al, 2016;Pennycook et al, 2020a). In the context of the coronavirus pandemic, initial findings confirm that analytically sophisticated individuals are less prone to believe various misinformation and pseudoscientific practices regarding coronavirus prevention and treatment, including fake news and conspiracy theories about its nature and origin (Alper et al, 2020;Čavojová et al, 2020;Erceg et al, 2020b;Pennycook et al, 2020bPennycook et al, , 2021Stanley et al, 2020;Teovanović et al, 2021). Furthermore, indicators of analytic thinking have shown to be significant and relatively strong negative predictors of various misperceptions and unfounded beliefs and knowledge about COVID-19 (Čavojová et al, 2020;Erceg et al, 2020b;Stanley et al, 2020;Swami and Barron, 2020;Pennycook et al, 2021).…”

“…However, studies conducted primarily in the US and Canada (regardless of the operationalization of political identity) point to the politicization and public polarization. For example, Pennycook et al (2021) found that conservativism (a mean of social and economic dimensions), at the end of March 2020, was associated with COVID-19 misperceptions in the US, Canada, and the UK, and the association was greater in the US than in the UK. This pattern was evident for perceptions of COVID-19 risk and behavior change intentions as well.…”

“…Overall, increasing evidence suggests that, in the US, Republicans and conservatives tend to express less concern or perceive a lower risk of coronavirus, and are less prone to increased responsible behavior (hygiene and physical distancing) than Democrats and liberals (Allcott et al, 2020;Calvillo et al, 2020;Pickup et al, 2020;Rothgerber et al, 2020;Conway et al, 2021;Kushner Gadarian et al, 2021;Pennycook et al, 2021). In addition, Republicans and conservatives are less accurate at discerning between real and fake news and less likely to share the news with accurate coronavirus content than Democrats or liberals (Calvillo et al, 2020;Pennycook et al, 2020b).…”

Elite party cues increase vaccination intentions among Republicans

“…Research in political science shows that members of the public often follow cues from their party's elites and ignore, or do the opposite of, cues from the other party's elites (3,4). Since the earliest months of the pandemic, virtually all COVID-19−related attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors have been heavily polarized along party lines (5,6). That this pattern extends to COVID-19 vaccination intentions poses a serious problem for the Biden administration.…”