Conspiracy Theories a Sign of Sane Thinking Study Shows

[seemslikeadream]

Point taken. Any other arcane color coding I should be aware of?

And just for the record, what was the point of this irony? I do not see where it added anything to the discussion. We certainly do not need to be reminded that there are folks out there who think that mom's apple pie is identified with patriotism in the constitution.

And furthermore, I do not see how calling me out on a reply to a vacuous posting is not itself a huge waste of time. I get the feeling it was simply a way of pointing out that I am not part of the in-group, and a way of calling me stupid without making it all too obvious. I assure you that my intelligence is far from lacking on any scientifically determined objective scale. Do I detect a note of "You can't be too bright because you don't agree with me"?

You can't be too bright

that's been your MO around here lately

hence the blow back

what was the point of this irony?

you never noticed norton style before this? my god man you've been here 7 years.....have you never read anything he's posted before this?

Style...it's allowed....it's fun ....it's entertaining...it's been going on for years here


the in crowd?...I think some people here would take exception to that

ask b p h ..I'm not in the in crowd....I'm insane suffering from psd and should be committed..only a couple people here like me...they've taken pity on my poor soul

a huge waste of time

that also could be said of what you had posted...if someone wanted to be annoying

[Searcher08]

Point taken. Any other arcane color coding I should be aware of?

AFAIK that is the only one.

And just for the record, what was the point of this irony? I do not see where it added anything to the discussion. We certainly do not need to be reminded that there are folks out there who think that mom's apple pie is identified with patriotism in the constitution.

There is a difference between irony and sarcasm. The green is for sarcasm.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irony#Verbal_irony


Verbal irony

According to A glossary of literary terms by Abrams and Hartman,

Verbal irony is a statement in which the meaning that a speaker employs is sharply different from the meaning that is ostensibly expressed. The ironic statement usually involves the explicit expression of one attitude or evaluation, but with indications in the overall speech-situation that the speaker intends a very different, and often opposite, attitude or evaluation.[12]

Verbal irony is distinguished from situational irony and dramatic irony in that it is produced intentionally by speakers. For instance, if a man exclaims, "I'm not upset!" but reveals an upset emotional state through his voice while truly trying to claim he's not upset, it would not be verbal irony by virtue of its verbal manifestation (it would, however, be situational irony). But if the same speaker said the same words and intended to communicate that he was upset by claiming he was not, the utterance would be verbal irony. This distinction illustrates an important aspect of verbal irony—speakers communicate implied propositions that are intentionally contradictory to the propositions contained in the words themselves. There are, however, examples of verbal irony that do not rely on saying the opposite of what one means, and there are cases where all the traditional criteria of irony exist and the utterance is not ironic.

In a clear example from literature, in Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, Mark Antony's speech after the assassination of Caesar appears to praise the assassins, particularly Brutus ("But Brutus says he was ambitious; / And Brutus is an honourable man"), while actually condemning them. "We're left in no doubt as to who's ambitious and who's honourable. The literal truth of what's written clashes with the perceived truth of what's meant to revealing effect, which is irony in a nutshell". [13]

Ironic similes are a form of verbal irony where a speaker intends to communicate the opposite of what they mean. For instance, the following explicit similes begin with the deceptive formation of a statement that means A but that eventually conveys the meaning not A:

as soft as concrete
as clear as mud
as pleasant as a root canal
"as pleasant and relaxed as a coiled rattlesnake" (Kurt Vonnegut from Breakfast of Champions)

The irony is recognizable in each case only by using knowledge of the source concepts (e.g., that mud is opaque, that root canal surgery is painful) to detect an incongruity.

In The Unauthorized Autobiography of Lemony Snicket, this formulation is broken down by the construction of an ironic simile followed by a reversion of the meaning so the statement once again means A.

"Today was a very cold and bitter day, as cold and bitter as a cup of hot chocolate, if the cup of hot chocolate had vinegar added to it and were placed in a refrigerator for several hours."
"The day was as normal as a group of seals with wings riding around on unicycles, assuming that you lived someplace where that was very normal."

Verbal irony and sarcasm

A fair amount of confusion has surrounded the issue regarding the relationship between verbal irony and sarcasm.

Fowler's A Dictionary of Modern English Usage states:

Sarcasm does not necessarily involve irony and irony has often no touch of sarcasm.

This suggests that the two concepts are linked but may be considered separately. The OED entry for sarcasm does not mention irony, but the irony entry reads:

A figure of speech in which the intended meaning is the opposite of that expressed by the words used; usually taking the form of sarcasm or ridicule in which laudatory expressions are used to imply condemnation or contempt.

The Encyclopædia Britannica has "Non-literary irony is often called sarcasm"; while the Webster's Dictionary entry is:

Sarcasm: 1 : a sharp and often satirical or ironic utterance designed to cut or give pain. 2 a : a mode of satirical wit depending for its effect on bitter, caustic, and often ironic language that is usually directed against an individual.

Partridge in Usage and Abusage would separate the two forms of speech completely:

Irony must not be confused with sarcasm, which is direct: sarcasm means precisely what it says, but in a sharp, caustic, ... manner.

The psychologist Martin, in The psychology of humour, is quite clear that irony is where "the literal meaning is opposite to the intended"; and sarcasm is "aggressive humor that pokes fun".[14] He has the following examples: For irony he uses the statement "What a nice day" when it is raining. For sarcasm, he cites Winston Churchill, who is supposed to have said, when told by Bessie Braddock that he was drunk, "But I shall be sober in the morning, and you will still be ugly", as being sarcastic, while not saying the opposite of what is intended.

Psychology researchers Lee and Katz (1998) have addressed the issue directly. They found that ridicule is an important aspect of sarcasm, but not of verbal irony in general. By this account, sarcasm is a particular kind of personal criticism leveled against a person or group of persons that incorporates verbal irony. For example, a woman reports to her friend that rather than going to a medical doctor to treat her cancer, she has decided to see a spiritual healer instead. In response her friend says sarcastically, "Oh, brilliant, what an ingenious idea, that's really going to cure you." The friend could have also replied with any number of ironic expressions that should not be labeled as sarcasm exactly, but still have many shared elements with sarcasm.

Most instances of verbal irony are labeled by research subjects as sarcastic, suggesting that the term sarcasm is more widely used than its technical definition suggests it should be (Bryant & Fox Tree, 2002; Gibbs, 2000). Some psycholinguistic theorists (e.g., Gibbs, 2000) suggest that sarcasm ("Great idea!", "I hear they do fine work."), hyperbole ("That's the best idea I have heard in years!"), understatement ("Sure, what the hell, it's only cancer..."), rhetorical questions ("What, does your spirit have cancer?"), double entendre ("I'll bet if you do that, you'll be communing with spirits in no time...") and jocularity ("Get them to fix your bad back while you're at it.") should all be considered forms of verbal irony. The differences between these rhetorical devices (tropes) can be quite subtle and relate to typical emotional reactions of listeners, and the rhetorical goals of the speakers. Regardless of the various ways theorists categorize figurative language types, people in conversation who are attempting to interpret speaker intentions and discourse goals do not generally identify, by name, the kinds of tropes used (Leggitt & Gibbs, 2000).

And furthermore, I do not see how calling me out on a reply to a vacuous posting is not itself a huge waste of time. I get the feeling it was simply a way of pointing out that I am not part of the in-group, and a way of calling me stupid without making it all too obvious. I assure you that my intelligence is far from lacking on any scientifically determined objective scale. Do I detect a note of "You can't be too bright because you don't agree with me"?

Your first sentence is pleonastic.
I read slad's comment as a gentle bringing to your attention of "are you aware how curmudgeonly you are being recently?"

[82_28]

Ah, lay off peeps. Balto did nothing to deserve this and he is a great "asset" to the community. Try and be a little circumspect about the fact that we all have our own personalities yet with common interests.

[norton ash]

Hell, I made the green statement to back up what the OP stated-- this is how vehement and nasty the 'reality crowd' gets when confronted with outside-the-box ideas. You see this kind of protest-too-much constantly at places like Gawker, Salon or Daily Kos-- the phrases I used are a few of their usual defensive cliches.

[Searcher08]

Ah, lay off peeps. Balto did nothing to deserve this and he is a great "asset" to the community. Try and be a little circumspect about the fact that we all have our own personalities yet with common interests.

Lord Balto is fine with me and I'm sure he knows that.

Back to the thread...

Here follows what (in my personal opinion) is disingenuous pseudoskeptic wankery of the highest order.

Prof. Chris French is a well known raving monster looney hardball pseudoskeptic, Randiphile and "debunker". http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_French

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3659314/

Notice that the definition of 'conspiracy theory' that he uses is from...
DAVID AARONOVITCH

and it must be useful to have 'peer review' that includes fellow pseudoskeptic researchers into 'conspiracy theory'. Really nice to know you are 'on the same page'.

Measuring Belief in Conspiracy Theories: The Generic Conspiracist Beliefs Scale

Robert Brotherton, Christopher C. French, and Alan D. Pickering

Abstract

The psychology of conspiracy theory beliefs is not yet well understood, although research indicates that there are stable individual differences in conspiracist ideation – individuals’ general tendency to engage with conspiracy theories. Researchers have created several short self-report measures of conspiracist ideation. These measures largely consist of items referring to an assortment of prominent conspiracy theories regarding specific real-world events. However, these instruments have not been psychometrically validated, and this assessment approach suffers from practical and theoretical limitations. Therefore, we present the Generic Conspiracist Beliefs (GCB) scale: a novel measure of individual differences in generic conspiracist ideation. The scale was developed and validated across four studies. In Study 1, exploratory factor analysis of a novel 75-item measure of non-event-based conspiracist beliefs identified five conspiracist facets. The 15-item GCB scale was developed to sample from each of these themes. Studies 2, 3, and 4 examined the structure and validity of the GCB, demonstrating internal reliability, content, criterion-related, convergent and discriminant validity, and good test-retest reliability. In sum, this research indicates that the GCB is a psychometrically sound and practically useful measure of conspiracist ideation, and the findings add to our theoretical understanding of conspiracist ideation as a monological belief system unpinned by a relatively small number of generic assumptions about the typicality of conspiratorial activity in the world.

Keywords: conspiracy theories, conspiracist ideation, individual differences, personality, psychometric instrument, scale design

Introduction

A conspiracist belief can be described as “the unnecessary assumption of conspiracy when other explanations are more probable” (Aaronovitch, 2009, p. 5). Substantial numbers of people endorse conspiracy theories proposing that the U.S. government orchestrated the 9/11 terrorist attacks (Stempel et al., 2007; Swami et al., 2010), that the British government is covering up its own role in the 7/7 bombings (Soni, 2007), and that the assassination of President John F. Kennedy was not the work of Lee Harvey Oswald alone (Goertzel, 1994; McHoskey, 1995), to name but a few popular conspiracy theories (see McConnachie and Tudge, 2008). Such beliefs are usually unsubstantiated and implausible, but are often regarded as harmless (e.g., Clarke, 2002). Yet some conspiracy theories are associated with negative outcomes; conspiracist beliefs about the origin and treatment of HIV/AIDS have been found to detrimentally affect attitudes toward preventative measures and adherence to treatment programs (Bogart et al., 2010), and conspiracist fears concerning the safety of childhood vaccinations have played a role in declining vaccination rates (Salmon et al., 2005; Kata, 2010; Offit, 2011). Other conspiracy theories can lead to social and political disengagement (Butler et al., 1995; Jolley and Douglas, 2013) and may help to foster political extremism (Bartlett and Miller, 2010).

To date only a small handful of studies have begun to investigate the formation and maintenance of conspiracy beliefs, largely examining the role of individual differences in broad personality traits and cognitive styles (e.g., Goertzel, 1994; McHoskey, 1995; Abalakina-Paap et al., 1999; Leman and Cinnirella, 2007; Douglas and Sutton, 2008, 2011; Swami et al., 2010, 2011, 2013; Darwin et al., 2011; Swami, 2012). The handful of available findings suggests that conspiracist beliefs are linked with traits such as low interpersonal trust, paranoia, and receptivity to other unusual beliefs. The relationships between conspiracy beliefs and more established psychological measures or general models of personality are largely unknown. Some research has examined correlations between conspiracist ideation and the Big-5. Weak but significant relationships have been reported with higher openness and lower agreeableness, however some studies have failed to replicate these relationships (see Swami et al., 2010, 2011, 2013; Swami and Furnham, 2012).

One robust finding to emerge from the limited existing literature is that individuals who endorse one conspiracy theory tend to endorse others, including unrelated theories (Goertzel, 1994; Swami et al., 2010, 2011, 2013), fictitious theories made up by psychological researchers (Swami et al., 2011), and even mutually contradictory theories (Wood et al., 2012). In total, these findings suggest that endorsement of conspiracy theories is not exclusively a result of rational evaluation of the evidence relating to each specific conspiracist claim; rather it appears there are stable individual differences in the general tendency to engage with conspiracist explanations for events. This trait has been termed “conspiracist ideation” (Swami et al., 2011).

Much more research is required to illuminate the psychology of conspiracist ideation, and the number of recent publications on the topic (e.g., Leman and Cinnirella, 2007; Douglas and Sutton, 2008, 2011; Bogart et al., 2010; Swami et al., 2010, 2011, 2013; Darwin et al., 2011; Newheiser et al., 2011; Swami, 2012; Wood et al., 2012; Jolley and Douglas, 2013) suggests that research is gaining momentum. However, research is limited by the lack of a validated measure of individual differences in conspiracist ideation. To produce a coherent body of research it is necessary to devise a valid and psychometrically sound measure which can be used across a variety of empirical contexts.
Previous approaches toward measuring conspiracist beliefs

Several scales have been created in an attempt to measure individual differences in conspiracist ideation. The dominant approach has been to devise a short self-report questionnaire assessing belief in a small number of conspiracy theories concerning real-world events and situations. Measures have consisted of between six and thirty items with each item referring to a specific currently popular claim of conspiracy. Common subjects include the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, the spread of HIV/AIDS, and the moon landing (Goertzel, 1994; Abalakina-Paap et al., 1999; Leman and Cinnirella, 2007; Darwin et al., 2011; Douglas and Sutton, 2011; Swami et al., 2013). Participants rate their endorsement of each item on a Likert-type rating scale ranging from certain disbelief to certain belief.

There has been little attempt to assess the psychometric properties of any existing measure; most studies have employed novel measures, with little consideration of the psychometric properties of the measure beyond noting the value of Cronbach’s alpha. In addition, no measure has yet been adopted by researchers other than the original authors. This situation presents practical and theoretical problems. Despite the apparent homogeneity of this approach toward measuring conspiracist ideation, idiosyncrasies in item content could influence participant responses. Each scale represents a unique sub-set of currently prominent conspiracy theories; for example, climate-change conspiracy theories feature in some scales (Douglas and Sutton, 2011) but not others (Swami et al., 2010). In addition, items from different scales referring to the same conspiracy theories may not be directly comparable due to differences in wording. Consider two items concerning conspiracy theories alleging the cover-up of extraterrestrials: “Governments are suppressing evidence of the existence of aliens” (Douglas and Sutton, 2011; Wood et al., 2012), and “Area 51 in Nevada, U.S., is a secretive military base that contains hidden alien spacecraft and/or alien bodies” (Swami et al., 2010). Although both items implicitly refer to the same theory, the differences in tone and specificity may systematically bias responses. It is possible therefore that existing scales do not produce equivalent or directly comparable measures of conspiracist ideation.

This practical problem could be resolved if researchers adopted a single standardized measure. However, any such measure would likely be unsuitable for cross-cultural research as responses may be confounded by the cultural familiarity and relevance (or lack thereof) of the selected theories (Byford, 2011). For example, conspiracy theories concerning the July 7, 2005, bombings in London are relatively well-known within the U.K., but are likely to be less familiar elsewhere. In addition, such a measure would require modification over time as particular conspiracy theories fade from popular awareness and new theories arise in response to world events.

A more fundamental theoretical problem is that existing scales assess attitudes toward a limited number of specific conspiracy theories, yet their intended purpose is to provide a measure of individuals’ generalized tendency toward conspiracy theorizing. A successful measure of this overall conspiracist ideation ought to reflect the entire spectrum of conspiracism. However, any measure referring to specific conspiracy theories faces the problem of selecting a small and arbitrary sub-set of real-world conspiracy theories out of a virtually infinite pool, with the assumption that the selected items are representative of the individual’s overall level of conspiracist ideation. While there is evidence that conspiracist ideation is a unidimensional construct (Goertzel, 1994; Swami et al., 2011; Wood et al., 2012), the content validity of short and potentially unrepresentative measures has thus far gone untested.

Measuring generic conspiracist beliefs

The issues discussed so far raise concerns over the comparability and generalizability of the handful of existing psychological findings, and the theoretical validity and practical utility of any measure which explicitly refers to prominent real-world conspiracy theories. An alternative and preferable approach toward measuring conspiracist ideation may be to assess generic conspiracist beliefs (GCB). Recent theoretical advances suggest that beliefs in specific conspiracy theories are a product of a smaller set of more GCB. Wood et al. (2012) demonstrated that endorsement of various specific conspiracy theories about the death of Osama Bin Laden is predicted by acceptance of the more general claim that the U.S. government is hiding some important information about the Bin Laden raid. Thus, assessing an individual’s attitude toward a single generic statement can provide a valid and economical indication of beliefs about numerous specific conspiracy theories.

It would be possible to produce a yet more generic scale item concerning the more abstract idea that governments routinely hide information about the deaths of public figures in order to deceive the public. Endorsement of this abstract claim would presumably provide a valid indication of an individual’s beliefs about many popular governmental assassination conspiracy theories, such as those concerning Osama Bin Laden, Princess Diana, and President John F. Kennedy. To take another example, rather than referring explicitly to conspiracy theories of the 9/11 attacks, a non-specific item would have individuals rate their acceptance of the more generic belief that conspiracy within governments to secretly perpetrate terrorist activities on their own citizens is commonplace. In sum, a scale which samples a representative range of these kinds of GCB would assess individuals’ beliefs about the typicality of conspiratorial activity in the real world removed from the context of specific historical events.

Taking this generic, non-event-based approach toward measuring conspiracist ideation can potentially overcome the previously mentioned theoretical and practical problems associated with measures referring to specific popular conspiracy theories. While constructing a measure which refers to specific real-world conspiracy theories necessitates arbitrarily selecting a small sub-set of conspiracy theories and thus compromising content validity, a generic measure could represent the entire spectrum of conspiracist ideation in an economical way by identifying and reflecting the most important generic beliefs which support beliefs in numerous specific conspiracy theories. While a measure referring to currently popular conspiracy theories will require modification as fashions in popular conspiracy theorizing change, a generic measure will remain an appropriate measurement device over time. In addition, by decontextualizing conspiracist beliefs, a generic measure can provide a measurement device suitable for any sample population.

To date, no measure of conspiracist ideation has been designed from the bottom-up, endeavoring to first identify the most important facets of conspiracism which a successful measure should represent, and to provide a measure which represents these facets. Our research was designed to produce such a measure.

Overview of the present studies

We developed and validated the GCB scale, a novel measure of individual differences in generic conspiracist ideation, across four studies with diverse samples. Informed consent was obtained from all participants and ethical approval for the research was granted by the Goldsmiths, University of London Department of Psychology Ethics Committee.

Study 1 details the first step toward creating a measure of generic conspiracist ideation, which was to identify the most important aspects of conspiracism which should be represented in the measure. To ensure content validity, a measure should sample from the entire gamut of conspiracist themes; however, a short measure is desirable so as to avoid practical problems associated with lengthy questionnaires such as participant frustration, careless responding, drop-out, and reluctance to take part in future studies (see Schmidt et al., 2003; Donnellan et al., 2006). To reconcile the conflicting requirements of brevity and completeness, a lengthy measure consisting of 75 generic conspiracist items was administered to an international sample of the general public and subjected to exploratory factor analysis (N = 489) to identify the underlying dimensions of conspiracism which a successful measure should represent. The 15-item GCB scale was created based on the results of this initial study, and the subsequent studies demonstrated the psychometric validity of this measure.

Study 2 aimed to establish content and criterion-related validity, as well as test-retest reliability, using a sample of undergraduate students (N = 235) as is typical of most psychological research. To this end, the factor structure of the scale, and its relationships with other measures of conspiracist ideation were examined. Study 3 aimed to establish convergent validity by examining how well the GCB relates to interpersonal trust, anomie, paranormal beliefs, and delusional ideation – individual difference factors previously found to correlate with belief in conspiracy theories (Goertzel, 1994; Darwin et al., 2011; Swami et al., 2011, 2013) – using a sample of the general public (N = 208). Study 4 aimed to establish discriminant validity by demonstrating the absence of relationships between the GCB and measures of other theoretically unrelated constructs using a separate sample of the general public (N = 194). These constructs consisted of sensation-seeking, emotional intelligence, and the Big Five factors.

Study 1: Identification of Essential Facets of Conspiracism through Exploratory Factor Analysis
Method
Participants and procedure

To recruit a large and diverse sample not composed exclusively of undergraduate psychology students, volunteers were requested via a blog post on psychologytoday.com and a public “Psychology of the Paranormal” emailing list. In all, 500 participants (225 females, 269 males; no gender data for 6 respondents) completed the questionnaire. Data from 11 participants missing data for 2 or more items were omitted (total valid N = 489). Age ranged from 18 to 87 years (M = 35.9; SD = 13.9). The majority of participants indicated that they were British (43.8%) or American (26.4%). Other nationalities accounted for 25.6% of the sample (4.2% did not provide nationality information). No reward was offered for taking part. Self-selected respondents completed the questionnaire online via a web-based interface.

*** Rest at the link***

General Discussion

The aim of this research was to create and validate a novel measure of individual differences in conspiracist ideation. Previously the dominant approach toward measuring conspiracist beliefs has involved assessing attitudes toward a small number of arbitrarily selected event-based conspiracy theories (e.g. Goertzel, 1994; Abalakina-Paap et al., 1999; Leman and Cinnirella, 2007; Swami et al., 2010; Darwin et al., 2011; Douglas and Sutton, 2011). Numerous scales have been devised, yet there has been little attempt to validate the various measures or to adopt a single measurement device, and there are concerns over the theoretical validity and practical utility of this general approach. To overcome these problems we elected to devise a measure which assesses acceptance of the generic assumptions which support belief in specific conspiracy theories.

Study 1 identified five facets of generic conspiracism through exploratory factor analysis: belief in routine governmental malfeasance; belief in the existence of MG conspiracies; belief in the existence and cover-up of extraterrestrials; concerns over the unethical CI; and belief in conspiracies infringing on PW and liberty. The existence of these dimensions is not inconsistent with other research which has found conspiracist ideation to be unidimensional (e.g., Goertzel, 1994; Swami et al., 2010; Wood et al., 2012; Bruder et al., 2013). Indeed, in the present research, the five identified dimensions of conspiracism were highly intercorrelated. We argue that the five identified facets reflect a small set of intercorrelated conspiracist assumptions which collectively serve to promote and sustain beliefs in individual conspiracy theories, resulting in a coherent network of specific conspiracist beliefs.

Based on the findings of Study 1, the GCB, a short measure sampling from each of the five identified facets of conspiracism, was produced. Studies 2, 3, and 4 provide evidence of the reliability, content, criterion, convergent, and discriminant validity of this novel measure. The results of confirmatory factor analysis reported in Study 2 demonstrated that the intended five-factor structure is retained in the 15-item GCB, ensuring that each important facet of conspiracism is successfully reflected in the measure. Overall GCB scores correlated strongly with scores on a measure of belief in various event-based conspiracy theories (the BCTI; Swami et al., 2010), as well as measures assessing belief in three specific conspiracy theories (9/11 theories, 7/7 theories, and fictitious Red Bull theories: Swami et al., 2010, 2011). The factor intercorrelations mean that in practical use the GCB can be considered a unidimensional measure; however, Study 2 also presented evidence that the individual factors may differentially predict endorsement of certain event-based conspiracy theories, to the extent that certain theories reflect certain facets of conspiracism to a greater or lesser degree. In sum, these findings indicate criterion-related validity; that is, that the five generic beliefs assessed by the GCB successfully predict endorsement of various real-world conspiracy theories.

Study 3 provided further evidence of criterion-related validity, finding GCB scores to predict general belief in various event-based conspiracy theories using an independent sample of the general public. In addition, and largely consistent with previous findings, GCB scores correlated with other related measures including low interpersonal trust, anomie, delusional ideation, paranormal belief, as well as conscientiousness (Goertzel, 1994; Darwin et al., 2011; Swami et al., 2011). Study 4 demonstrated that GCB scores were independent of unrelated psychological constructs including sensation seeking, emotional intelligence, extraversion, and neuroticism. Together, Study 3 and 4 indicate that the GCB possesses convergent and divergent validity.

It should be noted that the self-selection recruitment methods used in the current research may have resulted in unrepresentative samples; however we do not believe this to be the case. In Study 1, 3, and 4, efforts were made to recruit general-population samples diverse in terms of age, nationality, and beliefs. Study 2 allowed these samples to be compared with a sample of university students, as is typical of most psychological research. The GCB demonstrated acceptable psychometric properties when used with university students as well as when used with a self-selected sample drawn from the general population. Consistent with previous research, on the whole our samples indicated modest skepticism toward the existence of conspiracies (e.g., Goertzel, 1994; Abalakina-Paap et al., 1999; Swami et al., 2010, 2011). In addition, the relationships between the GCB and other psychological constructs were largely consistent with previous findings (e.g., Goertzel, 1994; Swami et al., 2010, 2011, 2013; Darwin et al., 2011).

Our findings show the GCB to be psychometrically at least as useful as any existing measure of conspiracist ideation which refers to specific event-based conspiracy theories (e.g., Goertzel, 1994; Swami et al., 2010; Douglas and Sutton, 2011). Given the strength of the relationships between the GCB and the BCTI (Swami et al., 2010), which refers to specific real-world conspiracy theories, it may be the case that either measure is equally useful when looking at a range of relatively homogeneous, particularly British and American, samples. However, the GCB has important advantages over these measures. By sampling from the entire range of universal and unchanging assumptions from which all specific conspiracy theories arise we have ensured content validity. In addition, by removing the context of particular historical events, the GCB offers a measurement device potentially suitable for more diverse sample populations and which will endure over time despite changing trends in popular conspiracy theorizing. We believe these practical benefits make the GCB a preferable measurement device for researchers wishing to assess conspiracist ideation.

Given the extent to which the results of exploratory factors analysis depend on the items which are created as input, it may have been possible to identify different facets of conspiracism by beginning with a different list of generic items. In Study 1, we aimed to reflect a wide range of the most popular conspiracy theories commonly discussed in the popular and academic literature. We believe the five facets we identified faithfully reflect the spectrum of popular conspiracy theorizing in Western cultures. However, different groups or cultures may be preoccupied with different types of conspiracy theories. In light of this, other measures of generic conspiracist ideation may be preferable in some contexts. Efforts to produce even more generic conspiracist measures than the GCB are underway (Bruder et al., 2013). The GCB specifies the content and objectives of some conspiracies (e.g., the suppression of new technology) while remaining non-specific about any entities or events involved in the conspiracies. In contrast, Bruder et al.’s Conspiracy Mentality Questionnaire (CMQ) remains largely non-specific in regards to both objectives and entities or events, with the exception of referring to specifically political conspiracies. Both approaches may have advantages and limitations in certain contexts. The relatively more generic approach of the CMQ may have particular advantages when studying non-Western and non-democratic cultures. Future research may seek to compare measures of conspiracist ideation across different cultures directly.

In addition to providing a validated measure of conspiracist ideation, the present findings also enhance our theoretical understanding of belief in conspiracy theories. Wood et al. (2012) demonstrated that relatively generic beliefs are important antecedents of specific conspiracy beliefs. The current findings extend upon this, identifying five underlying conspiracist beliefs and showing that these generic assumptions about the world strongly predict endorsement of various specific conspiracy theories. This is consistent with the idea that conspiracist ideation is a monological belief system (Goertzel, 1994; Wood et al., 2012) in which beliefs in many individual conspiracy theories are supported by relatively generic convictions such as the belief that governments routinely harm and deceive their citizens. Given the intercorrelations between the five conspiracist facets observed here, it is feasible that these convictions are themselves a product of even more abstract ideas, such as an essential distrust of authority. While it may be possible to construct a measure which aims to tap into these abstract sentiments, it is our opinion that the most successful measure of conspiracist ideation will be one which achieves an appropriate balance between specificity and abstractness, as we feel we have achieved with the GCB.

In sum, we believe our findings show that the GCB is a successful and psychometrically valid measure of individual differences in conspiracist ideation. The GCB has a number of advantages over existing measures of conspiracist ideation, making it a preferable measurement device for use in future research. The psychology of conspiracist beliefs is thus far a relatively under-researched topic, but recently it appears that more psychologists are turning their attention to conspiracy theories (Leman and Cinnirella, 2007; Douglas and Sutton, 2008, 2011; Bogart et al., 2010; Swami et al., 2010, 2011, 2013; Newheiser et al., 2011; Swami, 2012; Wood et al., 2012; Jolley and Douglas, 2013). It is our hope that the GCB will provide researchers wishing to assess individual differences in conspiracist ideation with a measurement device which can be used across a wide variety of empirical contexts, resulting in a consolidated and cohesive body of research.
Conflict of Interest Statement

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.
Acknowledgments

The authors wish to thank Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic for his assistance with this research. This work was supported by the Economic and Social Research Council [grant number ES/I90249X].

From Wiki - S08
Dr. Chamorro-Premuzic is one of the founders of Meta, a company that provides personality profiling to corporations to help them identify employees with entrepreneurial talent.[1][2] He also serves as a consultant for both the private and public sectors, with clients that have included JP Morgan, HSBC, Prudential, Unilever, the British Army, the BBC and Harvard’s Entrepreneurial Finance Lab.[3]

Appendix
Table A1

GCB scale instructions and item wording.
Beliefs About the World
There is often debate about whether or not the public is told the whole truth about various important issues. This brief survey is designed to assess your beliefs about some of these subjects. Please indicate the degree to which you believe each statement is likely to be true on the following scale: Definitely not true; Probably not true; Not sure/cannot decide; Probably true; Definitely true
1. The government is involved in the murder of innocent citizens and/or well-known public figures, and keeps this a secret
2. The power held by heads of state is second to that of small unknown groups who really control world politics
3. Secret organizations communicate with extraterrestrials, but keep this fact from the public
4. The spread of certain viruses and/or diseases is the result of the deliberate, concealed efforts of some organization
5. Groups of scientists manipulate, fabricate, or suppress evidence in order to deceive the public
6. The government permits or perpetrates acts of terrorism on its own soil, disguising its involvement
7. A small, secret group of people is responsible for making all major world decisions, such as going to war
8. Evidence of alien contact is being concealed from the public
9. Technology with mind-control capacities is used on people without their knowledge
10. New and advanced technology which would harm current industry is being suppressed
11. The government uses people as patsies to hide its involvement in criminal activity
12. Certain significant events have been the result of the activity of a small group who secretly manipulate world events
13. Some UFO sightings and rumors are planned or staged in order to distract the public from real alien contact
14. Experiments involving new drugs or technologies are routinely carried out on the public without their knowledge or consent
15. A lot of important information is deliberately concealed from the public out of self-interest

Article information
Front Psychol. 2013; 4: 279.
Published online May 21, 2013. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00279
PMCID: PMC3659314
Robert Brotherton,1,* Christopher C. French,1 and Alan D. Pickering1

1Department of Psychology, Goldsmiths University of London, London, UK
Edited by: Viren Swami, University of Westminster, UK

Reviewed by:
Alexander Weiss, The University of Edinburgh, UK;
Martin Bruder, University of Konstanz, Germany;
Karen Douglas, University of Kent, UK

** Bruder and Douglas are cited for conspiracy theory "papers" in the References **

*Correspondence: Robert Brotherton, Department of Psychology, Goldsmiths, University of London, New Cross, London SE14 6NW, UK. e-mail: ku.ca.dlog@notrehtorb.r
This article was submitted to Frontiers in Personality Science and Individual Differences, a specialty of Frontiers in Psychology.
Received February 6, 2013; Accepted May 1, 2013.
Copyright © 2013 Brotherton, French and Pickering.

This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in other forums, provided the original authors and source are credited and subject to any copyright notices concerning any third-party graphics etc.
This article has been cited by other articles in PMC.
Articles from Frontiers in Psychology are provided here courtesy of Frontiers Media SA

References (S08 Bolding)

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[Searcher08]

Hell, I made the green statement to back up what the OP stated-- this is how vehement and nasty the 'reality crowd' gets when confronted with outside-the-box ideas. You see this kind of protest-too-much constantly at places like Gawker, Salon or Daily Kos-- the phrases I used are a few of their usual defensive cliches.

* 100

I noticed a curious thing - that many of these people find non-binary thinking extremely threatening - in fact an *existential* threat.

Something which is outside their easy to play dualistic game playing (where they clearly see themselves as 'right' and others 'wrong') and possibly denying all the secondary things they get from that - is suddenly under threat - it feels like their world is falling down

which perhaps in a sense, it is.

[Searcher08]

Also, I think the first steps are being taken to create a standardised Measurement Instrument to test people for what is labelled as 'conspiracist thinking' but which is going into pure fucking Stasi territory? The underlying assumptions that French and Aaronovitch support are pure Statism. What better to do than under a pseudoskeptic research rubric, test all new applicants for anti-Statist tendancies.

Seriously, this is like a Sunnsteinian wetdream, not to mention a great example of the variety-reducing impact of pseudoskepticism - aka Cognitive Monoculture.

[Luther Blissett]

Maybe like a way to differentiate rigorous and anarchist conspiracy theory from statist paranoia?

[MacCruiskeen]

Maybe like a way to differentiate rigorous and anarchist conspiracy theory from statist paranoia?

Just don't use the horrible term at all. It's unsalvageable, worse than useless, a thought-killer, invented for that purpose by the CIA.

Just say no.

[coffin_dodger]

I noticed a curious thing - that many of these people find non-binary thinking extremely threatening - in fact an *existential* threat.

I assure you that my intelligence is far from lacking on any scientifically determined objective scale

Perhaps a salient moment to discuss the power of 'intelligence'.

What is it, regarding intelligence, that is so important to people? Why does someone else calling in to doubt the level of one's own intelligence (an imagined sleight, or real), burn like a bastard and cause immediate outrage and agitation? A grown man can be made to splutter, blush and get extremely angry if his 'intelligence' is called in to question. Hate can be generated quickly amongst neutral parties at the very mention of such blasphemy.

Yeah, intelligence is extremely important to us. Yet it remains one of the most subjective terms that I can think of. I can't think of a single person on this board who is not 'intelligent' - yet to simply be intelligent is not enough, is it? - there seems to need to be some kind of ranking system. A system that allows us to dismiss those 'not as intelligent as ourselves' as somehow not as rational, logical or 'right' as ourselves.

That's because the entire notion of 'intelligence' is a scam. It's a form of control, appealing to the narcissistic nature of humankind, instilled into you by a society easily able to control you.

It's a perfect catch22. Teach them they are intelligent. Intelligence means they are no fool. Not being a fool means they can't be caught in a con. Meanwhile, more malign forces keep us in the con. But it can't be, can it? - because we are intelligent, we will see the con...right?

'Intelligence' is elitist and heirarchical. (Sounder - that's another one for your 'methods of control' thread)

Perception and Empathy would be better measures of humankind. Intelligence is rotten.

[MacCruiskeen]

If I hear one more person say (with that inevitable sickly ingratiating smile) "I'm not a conspiracy theorist, but...", I am going to endure it patiently, as usual, probably.

[Belligerent Savant]

Maybe like a way to differentiate rigorous and anarchist conspiracy theory from statist paranoia?

Just don't use the horrible term at all. It's unsalvageable, worse than useless, a thought-killer, invented for that purpose by the CIA.

Just say no.

Precisely.

Loathe that term and the way it's utilized, both in mainstream chatter and as a tool for conditioning/disinforming.

[Searcher08]

I noticed a curious thing - that many of these people find non-binary thinking extremely threatening - in fact an *existential* threat.

I assure you that my intelligence is far from lacking on any scientifically determined objective scale

Perhaps a salient moment to discuss the power of 'intelligence'.

What is it, regarding intelligence, that is so important to people? Why does someone else calling in to doubt the level of one's own intelligence (an imagined sleight, or real), burn like a bastard and cause immediate outrage and agitation? A grown man can be made to splutter, blush and get extremely angry if his 'intelligence' is called in to question. Hate can be generated quickly amongst neutral parties at the very mention of such blasphemy.

Yeah, intelligence is extremely important to us. Yet it remains one of the most subjective terms that I can think of. I can't think of a single person on this board who is not 'intelligent' - yet to simply be intelligent is not enough, is it? - there seems to need to be some kind of ranking system. A system that allows us to dismiss those 'not as intelligent as ourselves' as somehow not as rational, logical or 'right' as ourselves.

That's because the entire notion of 'intelligence' is a scam. It's a form of control, appealing to the narcissistic nature of humankind, instilled into you by a society easily able to control you.

It's a perfect catch22. Teach them they are intelligent. Intelligence means they are no fool. Not being a fool means they can't be caught in a con. Meanwhile, more malign forces keep us in the con. But it can't be, can it? - because we are intelligent, we will see the con...right?

'Intelligence' is elitist and heirarchical. (Sounder - that's another one for your 'methods of control' thread)

Perception and Empathy would be better measures of humankind. Intelligence is rotten.

I really like the notion of multiple Intelligences a la Howard Gardner. It is vociferously attacked by pseudoskeptics too

[BrandonD]

Maybe like a way to differentiate rigorous and anarchist conspiracy theory from statist paranoia?

Just don't use the horrible term at all. It's unsalvageable, worse than useless, a thought-killer, invented for that purpose by the CIA.

Just say no.

Precisely.

Loathe that term and the way it's utilized, both in mainstream chatter and as a tool for conditioning/disinforming.

Agreed. I was talking to a close friend recently and he used the term "conspiracy theory" to refer to a crazy idea. The idea had nothing whatsoever to do with a conspiracy - I've seen people do the same with words like "communist", these words no longer have meaning among the general public, they are just insults empty of meaning.

It's hard work for those of us who are thoughtful to make concessions for those of us who are not.

[DrEvil]

I noticed a curious thing - that many of these people find non-binary thinking extremely threatening - in fact an *existential* threat.

I assure you that my intelligence is far from lacking on any scientifically determined objective scale

Perhaps a salient moment to discuss the power of 'intelligence'.

What is it, regarding intelligence, that is so important to people? Why does someone else calling in to doubt the level of one's own intelligence (an imagined sleight, or real), burn like a bastard and cause immediate outrage and agitation? A grown man can be made to splutter, blush and get extremely angry if his 'intelligence' is called in to question. Hate can be generated quickly amongst neutral parties at the very mention of such blasphemy.

Yeah, intelligence is extremely important to us. Yet it remains one of the most subjective terms that I can think of. I can't think of a single person on this board who is not 'intelligent' - yet to simply be intelligent is not enough, is it? - there seems to need to be some kind of ranking system. A system that allows us to dismiss those 'not as intelligent as ourselves' as somehow not as rational, logical or 'right' as ourselves.

That's because the entire notion of 'intelligence' is a scam. It's a form of control, appealing to the narcissistic nature of humankind, instilled into you by a society easily able to control you.

It's a perfect catch22. Teach them they are intelligent. Intelligence means they are no fool. Not being a fool means they can't be caught in a con. Meanwhile, more malign forces keep us in the con. But it can't be, can it? - because we are intelligent, we will see the con...right?

'Intelligence' is elitist and heirarchical. (Sounder - that's another one for your 'methods of control' thread)

Perception and Empathy would be better measures of humankind. Intelligence is rotten.

To be fair, some people really are smarter than most others, and some people really are stupid.
My main problem with stupid people is that so many of them are absolutely convinced that they're really smart (the Dunning-Kruger effect, they simply don't have the mental capacity to understand that they are stupid, which can be incredibly infuriating. I know at least one person who is literally dumb as a brick and convinced he's a genius. Some of the things he says are mind-boggling. Even when he's on the right track he will miss the most obvious basics and fuck everything up, but I can't tell him because: A) It's not polite, B) He's not going to believe me. He's to dumb to understand it when I try to explain), but as you say - this ties into the notion that people get very upset if they're called stupid, so it's not something you point out in civilized company.

It's okay to point out that someone is tall, overweight or blond, but god forbid that someone should point out that they're stupid. That's the ultimate blasphemy in our day and age.

Or to put it this way - if you have two perfectly nice and normal people, one with an IQ of 130, and the other with an IQ of 85 - who would you want to pilot your plane or direct traffic at an airport. Or perform brain surgery on you?

A quote from a teacher: "In the old days kids knew when they were stupid. Today they're so god damn stupid they don't even know it themselves."

Also, I don't think perception or empathy are any better as measures. You're still boiling the "worth" of a person down to a single characteristic.
And what about introverts?