Pummerer Lotte, Fock Lukas, Winter Kevin, Sassenberg Kai
Leibniz-Institut für Wissensmedien.
Universität Bremen.
J Soc Psychol. 2024 Sep 12:1-16. doi: 10.1080/00224545.2024.2397491.
Conspiracy beliefs (i.e. beliefs in specific conspiracy theories or the more general conspiracy mentality) are associated with a need for uniqueness and lower adherence to social norms. These findings suggest that conspiracy beliefs might be generally associated with less influence by majority opinions - absolutely and compared to minority opinions. In five experiments involving scenarios unrelated to conspiracy theories (overall = 1669), participants were informed about the majority/minority opinion on a given issue (e.g. the building of a tunnel), afterward indicating their evaluation or voting intentions regarding the issue. We then tested whether the influence of a majority/minority opinion on evaluation or voting intentions is moderated by conspiracy beliefs. Across studies, we find no significant moderation. A meta-analysis confirms no correlation between conspiracy beliefs and susceptibility to majority influence. Taken together, our studies provide no evidence for the assumption that those holding conspiracy beliefs reject majority opinions per se.
阴谋论信念（即对特定阴谋论或更普遍的阴谋心态的信念）与对独特性的需求以及对社会规范的较低遵守程度相关。这些发现表明，阴谋论信念可能总体上与多数意见的影响力较小相关——无论是绝对而言，还是与少数意见相比。在五个涉及与阴谋论无关场景的实验中（总计 = 1669人），参与者被告知关于某个特定问题（例如修建一条隧道）的多数/少数意见，随后表明他们对该问题的评估或投票意图。然后我们测试了多数/少数意见对评估或投票意图的影响是否受到阴谋论信念的调节。在各项研究中，我们没有发现显著的调节作用。一项荟萃分析证实，阴谋论信念与受多数意见影响的易感性之间没有相关性。综上所述，我们的研究没有为持有阴谋论信念的人本身会拒绝多数意见这一假设提供证据。
