Dispositional and Ideological Factor Correlate of Conspiracy Thinking and Beliefs

Arnulf, J. K., et al. (2022). 'Dispositional and Ideological Factor Correlate of Conspiracy Thinking and Beliefs.' PLoS One 17(10): e0273763.

16 Pages Posted: 29 Nov 2022

See all articles by Jan Ketil Arnulf

Jan Ketil Arnulf

BI Norwegian Business School

Charlotte Robinson

University of Bath - Department of Psychology

Adrian Furnham

BI Norwegian Business School

Date Written: October 26, 2022

Abstract

This study explored how the Big Five personality traits, as well as measures of personality disorders, are related to two different measures of conspiracy theories (CTs)The two measures correlated r = .58 and were applied to examine generalisability of findings. We also measured participants (N = 397) general knowledge levels and ideology in the form of religious and political beliefs. Results show that the Big Five and ideology are related to CTs but these relationships are generally wiped out by the stronger effects of the personality disorder scales. Two personality disorder clusters (A and B) were significant correlates of both CT measures, in both cases accounting for similar amounts of variance (20%). The personality disorders most predictive of conspiracy theories were related to the A cluster, characterized by schizotypal symptoms such as oddities of thinking and loose associations. These findings were corroborated by an additional analysis using Latent Semantic Analysis (LSA). LSA demonstrated that the items measuring schizotypal and related symptoms are cognitively related to both our measures of CTs. The implications for the studying of CTs is discussed, and limitations are acknowledged.

Note:
Funding Information: The author(s) received no specific funding for this work.

Conflict of Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Ethical Approval: Ethics permission was sought and received (CEHP/514/2017).

Keywords: Personality disorders, conspiracy beliefs, latent semantic analysis

Suggested Citation

Arnulf, Jan Ketil and Robinson, Charlotte and Furnham, Adrian, Dispositional and Ideological Factor Correlate of Conspiracy Thinking and Beliefs (October 26, 2022). Arnulf, J. K., et al. (2022). 'Dispositional and Ideological Factor Correlate of Conspiracy Thinking and Beliefs.' PLoS One 17(10): e0273763. , Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=4259442

Jan Ketil Arnulf (Contact Author)

BI Norwegian Business School ( email )

Nydalsveien 37
Oslo, 0442
Norway

Charlotte Robinson

University of Bath - Department of Psychology

Adrian Furnham

BI Norwegian Business School ( email )

Nydalsveien 37
Oslo, 0442
Norway

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