Are conspiracy beliefs a sign of flawed cognition? Reexamining the association of cognitive style and skills with conspiracy beliefs

Throughout human history, political leaders, oppositional forces, and businesspeople have frequently coordinated in secret for their own benefit and the public’s disadvantage. In these cases, conspiracy theories are capable of accurately describing our environment. However, the vast majority of research today operationalizes conspiracy theories as irrational beliefs that contradict our everyday knowledge. It is not surprising, then, that belief in implausible conspiracy theories has been associated with suboptimal information processing. To get a richer understanding of the phenomenon, we argue that researchers should have this limitation in mind when designing future studies.