A Birther and a Truther: The Influence of the Authoritarian Personality on Conspiracy Beliefs

A Birther and a Truther: The Influence of the Authoritarian Personality on Conspiracy Beliefs. Sean Richey. Politics & Policy, June 2017, Pages 465-485, http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/polp.12206/full

Abstract: I find that 10 percent of Americans believe in both "trutherism" and "birtherism." Even among citizens who say they like Bush or Obama, or are from the same party, many still believe in conspiracies implicating the presidents. It is crucial to understand why so many Americans believe obviously erroneous conspiracies that denigrate a president who otherwise has their support. I predict that the authoritarian personality creates a predisposition to believe in conspiracies based on the tendency of those high in this trait to have greater anxiety and cognitive difficulties with higher order thinking. Using 2012 American National Election Study data, I find a clear and robust relationship between the authoritarian personality and conspiratorial beliefs. In all models, authoritarianism is a chief predictor for a predisposition toward both conspiratorial beliefs. This suggests that psychological propensities are an important explanation of why so many citizens believe in conspiracy theories.

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Remember too: Imhoff, R., and Lamberty, P. K. (2017) Too special to be duped: Need for uniqueness motivates conspiracy beliefs. Eur. J. Soc. Psychol., doi: 10.1002/ejsp.2265, http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ejsp.2265/full