ReviewNature reviews psychology2023
Individual, intergroup and nation-level influences on belief in conspiracy theories.
Review in Nature reviews psychology, 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 32 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
32 citing papers in PubMed.
- Rejecting conspiracies doesn't necessarily mean that you're smart: The relationship between conspiracy discrimination and reasoning ability.The British journal of social psychology · 2026Article
- Perceived Social Isolation and Conspiracy Mentality: Exploring Pathways to Anti-LGBTQ+ Conspiracy Beliefs.Scandinavian journal of psychology · 2026Article
- Beneath the Surface of Unfounded Belief Systems: An Extended Test of the Dimensionality Hypothesis.Scandinavian journal of psychology · 2026Article
- Shattered Safety? Developmental Trajectories for Conspiracy Mentality and Violent Extremist Attitudes.Journal of youth and adolescence · 2026Article
- The Dual Impact of Believing and Spreading Conspiracy Theories: Independent and Interactive Effects on Social Perceptions and Orientations.Quarterly journal of experimental psychology (2006) · 2026Article
- Evaluating generative AI's potential to dispel misinformation about wind farms.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- Stability of Network Models Linking Personality to Conspiracy Mentality Before and During the COVID-19 Pandemic.Europe's journal of psychology · 2026Article
- Understanding Violent Radicalization and Conspiracy Belief in Dutch Youth Aged 16-25: A Latent Profile Analysis.Journal of youth and adolescence · 2026Article
- Why existential threats increase conspiracy beliefs: Evidence for the mediating roles of agency detection and pattern perception.British journal of psychology (London, England : 1953) · 2026Article
- Free from conspiracies: The negative relationship between societal freedom and belief in generic and content-specific conspiracy theories.The British journal of social psychology · 2026Article
- Understanding Unrest: Conspiracy Belief and Violent Radicalization Patterns in Young People During the COVID-19 Pandemic in the Netherlands.European journal on criminal policy and research · 2026Article
- Please reduce the gap! How psychological distance to politics fuels belief in conspiracy theories.The British journal of social psychology · 2026Article
- Victims of Conspiracies? An Examination of the Relationship Between Conspiracy Beliefs and Dispositional Individual Victimhood.European journal of social psychology · 2025Article
- 20-minute neighbourhoods, criticisms, conspiracy theories, and health: a critical discourse analysis.BMC public health · 2025Article
- Exploring the Relationship Between Conspiracy Theory Beliefs and Adherence to Government Guidelines During the COVID-19 Pandemic: The Role of Perceived Control and Trust in Social Media and Traditional Sources of Information.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Article
- How belief in conspiracy theories could harm sustainability.Nature human behaviour · 2025Review
- Conspiracy beliefs predict perceptions of procedural justice.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Diverse experiences, diverse adaptations: A multidimensional look at climate change responses.Ambio · 2025Article
- Prevalence, nature, and determinants of COVID-19-related conspiracy theories among healthcare workers: a scoping review.European psychiatry : the journal of the Association of European Psychiatrists · 2025Article
- Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Conspiracy theories are part of mainstream public life, with the potential to undermine governments, promote racism, ignite extremism and threaten public health efforts. Psychological research on conspiracy theories is booming, with more than half of the academic articles on the topic published since 2019. In this Review, we synthesize the literature with an eye to understanding the psychological factors that shape willingness to believe conspiracy theories. We begin at the individual level, examining the cognitive, clinical, motivational, personality and developmental factors that predispose people to believe conspiracy theories. Drawing on insights from social and evolutionary psychology, we then review research examining conspiracy theories as an intergroup phenomenon that reflects and reinforces societal fault lines. Finally, we examine how conspiracy theories are shaped by the economic, political, cultural and socio-historical contexts at the national level. This multilevel approach offers a deep and broad insight into conspiracist thinking that increases understanding of the problem and offers potential solutions.
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What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.