Seeing meaning even when none may exist: Collectivism increases belief in empty claims.

Abstract

People often find truth and meaning in claims that have no regard for truth or empirical evidence. We propose that one reason is that people value connecting and fitting in with others, motivating them to seek the common ground of communication and generate explanations for how claims might make sense. This increases the likelihood that people experience empty claims as truthful, meaningful, or even profound. Seven studies (N . 16,000 from the United States and China) support our prediction. People who score higher in collectivism (valuing connection and fitting in) are more likely to find fake news meaningful and believe in pseudoscience (Studies 1 to 3). China-U.S. cross-national comparisons show parallel effects. Relative to people from the United States, Chinese participants are more likely to see meaning in randomly generated vague claims (Study 4). People higher in collectivism are more likely to engage in meaning-making, generating explanations when faced with an empty claim, and having done so, are more likely to find meaning (Study 5). People who momentarily experience themselves as more collectivistic are more likely to see empty claims as meaningful (Study 6). People higher in collectivism are more likely to engage in meaning-making unless there is no common ground to seek (Study 7). We interpret our results as suggesting that conditions that trigger collectivism create fertile territory for the spread of empty claims, including fake news and misinformation.

Vaccination Acceptance Across Cultures: The Roles of Collectivism, Empathy, and Homophily

“…Before the main study, we conducted a pretest to assess our ability to momentarily shift participants’ endorsement of collectivistic values. Prior research has used situational cues to manipulate the accessibility of a collectivistic mindset (Lin, Zhang, and Oyserman 2021; Oyserman and Lee 2008). Recently, Lin, Zhang, and Oyserman (2021) used a forced-agreement paradigm in which participants assigned to the high-collectivism condition were forced to agree (e.g., scale endpoints: “slightly agree” and “completely agree”) with collectivistic statements, whereas participants assigned to the low-collectivism condition were forced to disagree (e.g., scale endpoints: “slightly disagree” and “completely disagree”).…”

“…The four statements were adapted from Oyserman (1993) and Lin, Zhang, and Oyserman (2021) and read as follows in the high- (low-) collectivism conditions, respectively: (1) “Sometimes others’ interests align with mine” (“Sometimes others’ interests don't align with mine”), (2) “Sometimes my opinions are similar to others” (“Sometimes my opinions are different than others”), (3) “In some ways I am very similar to others” (“In some ways I am unique”), and (4) “Sometimes I totally agree with others” (“Sometimes I totally disagree with others”).…”

“…We also assessed the success of the manipulation through self-report. Immediately following the collectivism manipulation, we measured participants’ self-reported endorsement of collectivistic values (1 = “strongly disagree,” and 7 = “strongly agree”) using the following collectivism scale items (alpha = .65) adapted from Lin, Zhang, and Oyserman (2021) and Oyserman (1993): “What is good for others, is good for me,” “Others’ wishes have a significant influence on what I choose to do,” and “I try to understand the needs and wants of others and act to fulfill them.” We averaged these items to create an index measure and, as intended, participants in the high-collectivism condition reported higher endorsement of collectivistic values (M = 5.13, SD = .97) than participants in the low-collectivism condition (M = 4.63, SD = 1.09, F(1, 103) = 6.19, p = .014, η normalp 2 = .057). The results support using this procedure for inducing a momentary shift in participants’ endorsement of collectivistic values.…”

“…Before the main study, we conducted a pretest to assess our ability to momentarily shift participants' endorsement of collectivistic values. Prior research has used situational cues to manipulate the accessibility of a collectivistic mindset (Lin, Zhang, and Oyserman 2021;Oyserman and Lee 2008).…”

Fake News Durante a Pandemia De Covid-19 E Ação Do Ministério Da Saúde No Brasil

“…Results: 56 messages certified as fake news were collected and disseminated in the pandemic phase, called preparation, alert and first responses. The main themes were: treatment, 30.3% (17), institutional discredit, 19.6% (11), cause, 17.8% (10), dissemination, 14.2% (8) and the other prevention and scientific mimesis with 8.9% (5) each. The month of February registered the highest number of posts, with the themes cause and treatment being the most expressive, and in the month of March the theme treatment became predominant.…”