Two online studies found that individuals with pronounced trait anger are more likely to believe in conspiracy theories. In these studies, participants were more prone to believing in theories that did not necessarily imply particularly evil intentions of the conspirators, as well as in those suggesting that the conspirators’ intentions were especially malicious. The paper was published in Personality and Individual Differences.
onspiracy theories are explanations of events that attribute the cause to a group of powerful individuals operating in secret to devise hidden plans that benefit themselves while harming the common good. They often emerge in response to uncertainty, fear, or mistrust of authority, offering simple explanations for complex events. Common examples include beliefs in government cover-ups, hidden agendas by corporations, or the manipulation of historical events (e.g., claims that the Moon landings were faked or that the COVID-19 pandemic was planned in advance). These theories can spread rapidly through social media and communities, creating echo chambers where believers reinforce one another’s views.
Study author Eddie Harmon-Jones and his colleagues noted that a conspiracy theory typically has three components: the existence of a powerful group, their secret collusion, and their engagement in behaviors that benefit themselves and harm others. Conspiracy theories differ in the degree of evil intentions attributed to the alleged powerful group. In some cases, the alleged conspirators’ intentions are not particularly evil (e.g., covering up that the Earth is flat), while in others, the group is perceived as acting with deeply malicious intent (e.g., orchestrating the murder of a famous individual).
The authors propose that studying the perceived evilness of the conspirators’ intentions is an important aspect of understanding conspiracy theories. They divided conspiracy theories into two categories—those involving low-evil and high-evil intentions—and conducted two studies to identify the psychological characteristics that predict belief in each type.
The aim of the first study was to test a new questionnaire that differentiates between high- and low-evil conspiracy theories. The study involved 112 adults recruited via Prolific, with an average age of 36 years, of whom 49% were female.
Participants completed an online survey that included the new conspiracy questionnaire (termed the Belief in Evil Conspiracy Theories Questionnaire) and assessments of humility (the Brief State Humility Scale), intellectual humility (the General Intellectual Humility Scale), trait anger (the Anger subscale of the Aggression Questionnaire), and satisfaction with life (the Satisfaction with Life Scale).
The questionnaire asked participants about their beliefs in 24 different conspiracy theories. For each theory, the researchers created both a low-evil and a high-evil version. Participants were divided into two groups; one group rated their belief in 12 high-evil and 12 low-evil theories, while the other group rated the opposing versions. This design allowed the researchers to gather ratings for both high- and low-evil versions of each theory.
The second study included 165 United States residents, also recruited via Prolific, with an average age of 39 years, of whom 49% were female. Participants completed a revised version of the conspiracy belief questionnaire and the same assessments as in Study 1. In addition, they rated how evil they perceived the intentions of the conspirators in each conspiracy theory.
As expected, participants rated the high-evil versions of conspiracy theories as more malicious than the low-evil versions. They were also more likely to believe in the low-evil versions than in the high-evil versions. Participants with more pronounced trait anger—individuals more prone to experiencing anger—were more likely to believe in both types of conspiracy theories. Younger participants were more likely to believe in both types of theories, while less educated individuals were more likely to believe in low-evil, but not high-evil, conspiracy theories.
Among all the factors examined, conspiracy mentality had the strongest association with belief in both types of conspiracy theories. Conspiracy mentality refers to a general tendency to believe that significant events or circumstances are secretly manipulated by powerful groups, even in the absence of supporting evidence. Individuals who were likely to believe in low-evil conspiracy theories were also more likely to believe in high-evil conspiracy theories.
“The current research provides evidence for the role of evil intentions in the relationship between trait anger and conspiracy beliefs. By manipulating the evil intentions of conspirators, we showed that in individuals with higher levels of trait anger might be particularly prone to believe in high-evil conspiracies, thereby expanding upon our previous correlational research,” the study authors concluded.
The study makes a valuable contribution to the understanding of conspiracy theory beliefs by incorporating the perceived evilness of the conspirators’ intentions. However, the studies were conducted on relatively small online samples. Research on larger, more diverse demographic groups that better represent the general population may yield different results.
The paper, “Belief in conspiracy theories that differ in evil intentions: Correlations with anger and other traits,” was authored by Eddie Harmon-Jones, Kinga Szymaniak, Gabriel Sebban, and Cindy Harmon-Jones.
