Conspiracy theories and their societal effects during the COVID-19 pandemic

Abstract

Conspiracy theories offer unvalidated explanations for important political and societal events and thus are likely to develop around a crisis, such as the Corona pandemic. Research has shown that a general tendency to believe in conspiracy theories—a so-called conspiracy mentality—comes with negative societal consequences, such as decreased social engagement and less trust in authorities. However, this has not been tested for concrete conspiracy theories like the ones around the Corona pandemic. Social engagement and trust in authorities are essential to successfully fight the pandemic. Therefore, we examined the relation between the belief in two Corona-related conspiracy theories and trust in authorities, support for governmental regulations, social engagement, social distancing, and hygiene measures in two studies (total N = 909). Believing in a Political Corona Conspiracy (accusing government and media) showed a stronger (and unique) negative relation to all desired outcomes than believing in a China Corona Conspiracy (accusing China of developing the virus). However, believing in the theories was not related to hygiene measures. Overall, believing in specific conspiracy theories predicts harmful attitudes and behaviours similarly to conspiracy mentality, but to a stronger extent. Findings underscore the relevance of conspiracy theories in the context of the Corona pandemic.

A Bioweapon or a Hoax? The Link Between Distinct Conspiracy Beliefs About the Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) Outbreak and Pandemic Behavior

“…Adding to the robustness of the findings, another study conducted within the German context (reported in the Supplemental Material) closely replicated this general pattern. This seems noteworthy as another data set from the German context failed to find strong relations between conspiracy endorsement and hygiene measures (Pummerer & Sassenberg, 2020).…”

Antecedents and consequences of COVID-19 conspiracy beliefs: a systematic review

“…Pseudoscientific health practice may be adopted instead of scientifically supported safeguarding behaviours 5,6,15,22,103,106 , which often promote anti-vaccination attitudes, which might further explain the relation between conspiracy beliefs and reduced vaccinations intentions 13,61,90 .…”

“…Distrust in the government, the military, doctors, scientists, the World Health Organization (WHO), the United Nations, and the European Union (EU) were associated with belief in COVID-19 conspiracy theories in England 5 and in part in Romania82 . Distrust in government officials further mediated the relationship of (political) COVID-19 and generic conspiracy beliefs with reduced adherence to guidelines in Croatia7 and Germany86,90 . Moreover, for citizens in the United States, belief in COVID conspiracy theories was associated with more trust in the country's government15 and President Trump…”

Information about herd immunity through vaccination and empathy promote COVID-19 vaccination intentions

“…Informationally, the COVID-19 pandemic has led to an "infodemic" that is, the deliberate and massive circulation of "wrong information to undermine the public health response" (WHO, 2020c). Given the historical abundance of conspiracy theories about vaccines, it is unsurprising that COVID-19 vaccination has also been a key target of misinformation (e.g., Imhoff & Lamberty, 2020;Pummerer et al, 2020), something that may have led to increased vaccine hesitancy during the pandemic . Added to this informational challenge is an equally potent motivational challenge-that is, motivating vaccination even among those not directly at risk of severe illness from .…”