Metadata

• Authors: Florian Buchmayr, André Krouwel
• Publication Date: 20 March 2025
• Journal/Source: Political Psychology
• URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/pops.13085

Abstract

While the psychological dispositions that underlie conspiracy thinking are well researched, there has been remarkably little research on the political preferences of conspiracy believers that go beyond self-reported ideology or single political issue dimensions. Using data from the European Voter Election Study (EVES), the relationship between conspiracy thinking and attitudes on three deeper-lying and salient political dimensions (redistribution, authoritarianism, migration) is examined. The results show a clear picture: Individuals with economically left-wing and culturally conservative attitudes tend to score highest on conspiracy thinking. People at this ideological location seem to long for both economic and cultural protection and bemoan a “lost paradise” where equalities had not yet been destroyed by “perfidious” processes of cultural modernization and economic neoliberalism. This pattern is found across all countries and holds regardless of socioeconomic characteristics such as education and income. While previous research has found that belief in conspiracies tends to cluster at the extremes of the political spectrum, our analysis opens up a more complex picture, showing that conspiracy thinking is not merely related to extremist orientations, but to specific combinations of political attitudes.

Key Findings

• Conspiracy thinking is highest among those with economically left-wing and culturally conservative attitudes.
• This ideological group seeks both economic and cultural protection, mourning a perceived “lost paradise.”
• The pattern of conspiracy belief holds across various countries and socioeconomic factors like education and income.

Notes