Conspiracy theorists actively seek out their online communities
Don’t (just) blame echo chambers. Conspiracy theorists actively seek out their online communities
Colin Klein, Adam Dunn, Peter Clutton
The Conversation
Why do people believe conspiracy theories? Is it because of who they are, what they’ve encountered, or a combination of both?
The answer is important. Belief in conspiracy theories helps fuel climate change denial, anti-vaccination stances, racism, and distrust of the media and science.
In a paper published in Plos One, Colin Klein and co-authors shed light on the online world of conspiracy theorists, by studying a large set of user comments.
Their key findings were that people who eventually engage with conspiracy forums differ from those who don’t in both where and what they post. The patterns of difference suggest they actively seek out sympathetic communities, rather than passively stumbling into problematic beliefs.
Read a summary of this research in The Conversation piece here.