Measuring individual differences in generic beliefs in conspiracy theories across cultures: Conspiracy Mentality Questionnaire

Frontiers in Psychology

Volumn 4, Issue , 2013, Pages

  Bruder, Martin ^a   Haffke, Peter ^a   Neave, Nick ^b   Nouripanah, Nina ^c   Imhoff, Roland ^d  

^a UNIVERSITY OF KONSTANZ   (Germany)

^b NORTHUMBRIA UNIVERSITY   (United Kingdom)

^c CITY UNIVERSITY   (United Kingdom)

^d UNIVERSITY OF COLOGNE   (Germany)

Author keywords

conspiracy mentality; conspiracy theories; cross cultural research; generalized political attitudes; measurement equivalence; psychometric instrument

Indexed keywords

EID: 85157013502     PISSN: None     EISSN: 16641078     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00225     Document Type: Article

References (60)

1. Abalakina-Paap, M., Stephan, W. G., Craig, T., and Gregory, W. L. (1999). Beliefs in conspiracies. Polit. Psychol. 20, 637–647.
2. Adorno, T. W., Frenkel-Brunswik, E., Levinson, D. J., and Sanford, R. N. (1950). The Authoritarian Personality. New York, NY: Harper.
3. Bogart, L. M., Wagner, G., Galvan, F. H., and Banks, D. (2010). Conspiracy beliefs about HIV are related to antiretroviral treatment nonadher-ence among African American men with HIV. J. Acquir. Immune Defic. Syndr. 53, 648–655.
4. Brislin, R. W. (1970). Back-translation for cross-cultural research. J. Cross Cult. Psychol. 1, 185–216.
5. Brotherton, R., French, C. C., and Pickering, A. D. (in press). Measuring belief in conspiracy theories: the generic conspiracist beliefs scale. Front. Psychol.
6. Browne, M. W., and Cudeck, R. (1992). Alternative ways of assessing model fit. Sociol. Methods Res. 21, 230–258.
7. Butler, L. D., Koopman, C., and Zim-bardo, P. G. (1995). The psychological impact of viewing the film “JFK”: emotions, beliefs, and political behavioral intentions. Polit. Psychol. 16, 237–257.
8. Byrne, B. M. (2008). Testing for multigroup equivalence of a measuring instrument: a walk through the process. Psicothema 20, 872–882.
9. Byrne, B. M. (2009). Testing for instrument equivalence in cross-cultural comparisons of self-concept: a look at some of the complexities. Paper Presented at the 5th International Biennial SELF Research Conference, Dubai.
10. Byrne, B. M. (2010). Structural Equation Modeling with AMOS: Basic Concepts Applications and Programming. New York: Psychology Press.
11. Chen, F. F. (2007). Sensitivity of goodness of fit indexes to lack of measurement invariance. Struct. Equ. Modeling 14, 464–504.
12. Cheung, G. W., and Rensvold, R. B. (2002). Evaluating goodness-of-fit indexes for testing measurement invariance. Struct. Equ. Modeling 9, 233–255.
13. Darwin, H., Neave, N., and Holmes, J. (2011). Belief in conspiracy theories. The role of paranormal belief, paranoid ideation and schizotypy. Pers. Individ. Dif. 50, 1289–1293.
14. Douglas, K. M., and Sutton, R. M. (2008). The hidden impact of conspiracy theories: perceived and actual influence of theories surrounding the death of Princess Diana. J. Soc. Psychol. 148, 210–221.
15. Fenigstein, A., and Vanable, P. A. (1992). Paranoia and self-consciousness. J. Pers. Soc. Psychol. 62, 129–138.
16. Funke, F. (2005). The dimensionality of right-wing authoritarianism: lessons from the dilemma between theory and measurement. Polit. Psychol. 26, 195–218.
17. Geisinger, K. F. (1994). Cross-cultural normative assessment: translation and adaptation issues influencing the normative interpretation of assessment instruments. Psychol. Assess. 6, 304–312.
18. Goertzel, T. (1994). Belief in conspiracy theories. Polit. Psychol. 15, 731–742.
19. Gray, M. (2010). Conspiracy Theories in the Arab World: Sources and Politics. New York, NY: Routledge.
20. Grzesiak-Feldman, M. (2013). The effect of high-anxiety situations on conspiracy thinking. Curr. Psychol. 32, 100–118.
21. Grzesiak-Feldman, M., and Ejsmont, A. (2008). Paranoia and conspiracy thinking of Jews. Psychol. Rep. 102, 884–886.
22. Hambleton, R. K. (2005). “Issues, designs, and technical guidelines for adapting tests into multiple languages and cultures,” in Adapting Educational and Psychological Tests for Cross-Cultural Assessment, eds R. K. Hambleton, P. F. Merenda, and C. D. Spielberger (Mahwah, NJ: Erl-baum), 3–38.
23. Harrison, A. A., and Thomas, J. M. (1997). The Kennedy assassination, unidentified flying objects, and other conspiracies: psychological and organizational factors in the perception of “cover-up.” Syst. Res. Behav. Sci. 14, 113–128.
24. Henrich, J., Heine, S. J., and Norenza-yan, A. (2010). The weirdest people in the world? Behav. Brain Sci. 33, 61–135.
25. Holm, N. (2009). Conspiracy theorizing surveillance: considering modal-ities of paranoia and conspiracy in surveillance studies. Surveill. Soc. 7, 36–48.
26. Hu, L.-T., and Bentler, P. M. (1999). Cutoff criteria for fit indexes in covariance structure analysis: conventional criteria versus new alternatives. Struct. Equ. Modeling 6, 1–55.
27. Imhoff, R., and Bruder, M. (in press). Speaking (un-)truth to power: conspiracy mentality as a generalized political attitude. Eur. J. Personality.
28. Irwin, H. J. (1993). Belief in the paranormal: a review of the empirical literature. J. Am. Soc. Psych. Res. 87, 1–39.
29. Kata, A. (2010). A postmodern Pan-dora’s box: anti-vaccination misinformation on the internet. Vaccine 28, 1709–1716.
30. Kay, A. C., Whitson, J. A., Gaucher, D., and Galinsky, A. D. (2009). Compensatory control: achieving order through the mind, our institutions, and the heavens. Curr. Dir. Psychol. Sci. 18, 264–268.
31. Kenny, D. (2012). Measuring Model Fit. Available at: http://davidakenny.net/cm/fit.htm [accessed December 20, 2012].
32. Leiserowitz, A. (2006). Climate change risk perception and policy preferences: the role of affect, imagery, and values. Clim. Change 77, 45–72.
33. MacCallum, R. C., Browne, M. W., and Sugawara, H. M. (1996). Power analysis and determination of sample size for covariance structure modeling. Psychol. Methods 1, 130–149.
34. Mason, O., Claridge, G., and Jackson, M. (1995). New scales for the assessment of schizotypy. Pers. Individ. Dif. 18, 7–13.
35. McHoskey, J. W. (1995). Case closed? On the John F. Kennedy assassination: biased assimilation of evidence and attitude polarization. Basic Appl. Soc. Psych. 17, 395–409.
36. Moscovici, S. (1987). “The conspiracy mentality,” in Changing Conceptions of Conspiracy, eds C. F. Graumann and S. Moscovici (New York, NY: Springer), 151–169.
37. Paulhus, D. (1983). Sphere-specific measures of perceived control. J. Pers. Soc. Psychol. 44, 1253–1265.
38. Peterson, R. A. (2001). On the use of college students in social science research: insights from a second-order meta-analysis. J. Consum. Res. 28, 450–461.
39. Pipes, D. (1998). The Hidden Hand: Middle East Fears of Conspiracy. New York, NY: St. Martin’s Press.
40. Pratto, F., Sidanius, J., Stallworth, L. M., and Malle, B. F. (1994). Social-dominance orientation – a personality variable predicting social and political-attitudes. J. Pers. Soc. Psychol. 67, 741–763.
41. Raine, A., and Benishay, D. (1995). The SPQ-B: a brief screening instrument for schizotypal personality disorder. J. Pers. Disord. 9, 346–355.
42. Rammstedt, B., and John, O. P. (2005). Kurzversion des Big Five Inventory (BFI-K): entwicklung und vali-dierung eines ökonomischen inven-tars zur erfassung der fünf fak-toren der persönlichkeit [Short version of the Big Five Inventory (BFI-K): development and validation of an economic inventory for assessment of the five factors of personality]. Diagnostica 51, 195–206.
43. Ramsay, R. (2006). Conspiracy Theories. Harpenden: Pocket Essentials.
44. Reips, U.-D., and Lengler, R. (2005). The web experiment list: a web service for the recruitment of participants and archiving of Internet-based experiments. Behav. Res. Methods 37, 287–292.
45. Ross, M. W., Essien, E. J., and Torres, I. (2006). Conspiracy beliefs about the origin of HIV/AIDS in four racial/ethnic groups. J. Acquir. Immune Defic. Syndr. 41, 342–344.
46. Sjörberg, L. (2002). “. . .Then we take Berlin”: the perceived risk of terrorism. SSE/EFI Working Paper series in Business Administration 2002:11. Stockholm: Economic Research Institute, Center for Risk Research.
47. StatSoft Inc. (2012). Electronic Statistics Textbook. Tulsa, OK: StatSoft. [Online].
48. Stempel, C., Hargrove, T., and Stempel, G. H. (2007). Media use, social structure, and belief in 9/11 conspiracy theories. Journal. Mass Commun. Q. 84, 353–372.
49. Swami, V. (2012). Social psychological origins of conspiracy theories: the cae of the Jewish conspiracy theory in Malaysia. Front. Psychol. 3:280. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2012.00280
50. Swami, V., Chamorro-Premuzic, T., and Furnham, A. (2010). Unanswered questions: a preliminary investigation of personality and individual difference predictors of 9/11 conspiracist beliefs. Appl. Cogn. Psychol. 24, 749–761.
51. Swami, V., Coles, R., Stieger, S., Pietschnig, J., Furnham, A., Rehim, S., et al. (2011). Conspiracist ideation in Britain and Austria: evidence of a monological belief system and associations between individual psychological differences and real-world and fictitious conspiracy theories. Br. J. Psychol. 102, 443–463.
52. Thorson, J. A., and Powell, F. C. (1992). A revised death anxiety scale. Death Stud. 16, 507–521.
53. Tobacyk, J., and Milford, G. (1983). Belief in paranormal phenomena: assessment instrument development and implications for personality functioning. J. Pers. Soc. Psychol. 44, 1029–1037.
54. van de Vijver, F., and Hambleton, R. K. (1996). Translating tests: some practical guidelines. Eur. Psychol. 1, 89–99.
55. Van Prooijen, J.-W., and Jostmann, N. B. (2013). Belief in conspiracy theories: the influence of uncertainty and perceived morality. Eur. J. Soc. Psychol. 43, 109–115.
56. von Collani, G. (2002). Das konstrukt der sozialen dominanzorientierung als generalisierte einstellung: eine replikation [The construct of social dominance orientation as a generalized attitude: a repli-cation]. Z. Polit. Psychol. 10, 263–282.
57. Waytz, A., Cacioppo, J., and Epley, N. (2010). Who sees human? The stability and importance of individual differences in anthropomorphism. Perspect. Psychol. Sci. 5, 219–232.
58. Whitson, J. A., and Galinsky, A. D. (2008). Lacking control increases illusory pattern perception. Science 322, 115–117.
59. Wood, M. J., Douglas, K. M., and Sutton, R. M. (2012). Dead and alive: beliefs in contradictory conspiracy theories. Soc. Psychol. Pers. Sci. 3, 767–773.
60. Zonis, M., and Joseph, C. M. (1994). Conspiracy thinking in the Middle East. Polit. Psychol. 15, 443–459.