TY - JOUR
T1 - Not-so-straightforward links between believing in COVID-19-related conspiracy theories and engaging in disease-preventive behaviours
AU - Chan, Hoi Wing
AU - Chiu, Connie Pui Yee
AU - Zuo, Shijiang
AU - Wang, Xue
AU - Liu, Li
AU - Hong, Ying yi
N1 - Funding Information:
We would like to thank Christa Schmidt for helping to identify COVID-19-related conspiracy theories and offering useful comments on the earlier version of the manuscript. This research is partially funded by a post-doctoral fellowship conferred to H-W Chan by the Research Committee of the Chinese University of Hong Kong, internal research grants by Beijing Normal University, China, and a General Research Fund (Ref No. 14621920) by Research Grant Council of Hong Kong SAR government awarded to Y Hong.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021, The Author(s).
PY - 2021/12
Y1 - 2021/12
N2 - Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, pertinent conspiracy theories have proliferated online, raising the question: How might believing in those conspiracy theories be linked with engagement in disease-preventive behaviours? To answer this, we conducted a repeated cross-sectional survey of around 1500 respondents to examine the link between conspiracy-theory beliefs and disease-preventive behaviours across six time-points in the United States from early February to late March 2020. The findings reveal that believing in risk-acceptance conspiracy theories (RA-CTs; e.g., “COVID-19 is a man-made bioweapon”) was linked to more preventive behaviours. However, believing in risk-rejection conspiracy theories (RR-CTs; e.g., “COVID-19 is like influenza and was purposefully exaggerated”) was associated with fewer preventive behaviours. These differential links were mediated by risk perception and negative emotions and modulated by the stage of the outbreak—RA-CTs predicted higher risk perception in the mild stage, whereas RR-CTs predicted lower risk perception in the severe stage.
AB - Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, pertinent conspiracy theories have proliferated online, raising the question: How might believing in those conspiracy theories be linked with engagement in disease-preventive behaviours? To answer this, we conducted a repeated cross-sectional survey of around 1500 respondents to examine the link between conspiracy-theory beliefs and disease-preventive behaviours across six time-points in the United States from early February to late March 2020. The findings reveal that believing in risk-acceptance conspiracy theories (RA-CTs; e.g., “COVID-19 is a man-made bioweapon”) was linked to more preventive behaviours. However, believing in risk-rejection conspiracy theories (RR-CTs; e.g., “COVID-19 is like influenza and was purposefully exaggerated”) was associated with fewer preventive behaviours. These differential links were mediated by risk perception and negative emotions and modulated by the stage of the outbreak—RA-CTs predicted higher risk perception in the mild stage, whereas RR-CTs predicted lower risk perception in the severe stage.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85105278035&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1057/s41599-021-00781-2
DO - 10.1057/s41599-021-00781-2
M3 - Journal article
AN - SCOPUS:85105278035
SN - 2662-9992
VL - 8
JO - Humanities and Social Sciences Communications
JF - Humanities and Social Sciences Communications
IS - 1
M1 - 104
ER -