Dr Daniel Jolley

Measles hit decades-high levels last year, and this dangerous, highly contagious virus is surging again Measles is back and highly contagious. Learn about the 2025–26 spikes, the danger for young children and how vaccines prevent severe illness.

This is what happens when the Secretary of HHS rejects science and adopts conspiracy theories.

And, unless we stop it, epidemics could become much worse.

www.uchealth.org/today/is-mea...

What do laypeople think causes conspiracy beliefs?

We (@kaiepstude.bsky.social, Bob Fennis, and I) look at this and other questions in a new PSPB paper combining six correlational studies and a qualitative one.

Read the open-access paper here: journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

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Job Opportunity at the University of Kent: Lecturer in Psychology The School of Psychology is seeking to appoint a Lecturer in Psychology and a Lecturer in Psychology focusing on Cognition and Neuroscience  to join a collegial, supportive, and intellectually vibrant...

Kent Psychology is hiring 🎓We have two posts: 1) open area and 2) cog neuro. More details can be found here: jobs.kent.ac.uk/vacancy.aspx... Feel free to reach out with questions!

Law and order, magical spirits, and false flag operations: On the co‐occurrence of authoritarianism, spirituality, and conspiracy beliefs and their association with support of violent protests In Western democracies, commentators have noted an unprecedented diversity in protest movements opposing ecological and health regulations, including traditional right-wing authoritarians alongside c...

“Law and Order, Magical Spirits, and False Flag Operations: On the Co-Occurrence of Authoritarianism, Spirituality, and Conspiracy Beliefs and Their Association with Support of Violent Protests” in Political Psychology onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Figure 1. Treatment and control images Image on the left shows mobile phone on facebook page with a section indicating false information checked by independent fact-checkers blurring out a photo. Image on the right is control image, of a facebook login screen.

Figure 2. Simple slopes, Facebook fact-check treatment, conspiracy mentality, and ideology. This analysis indicated that our fact-check treatment increases perceptions of Facebook-related conspiracy beliefs, but only among participants who score highest on conspiracy mentality and who also identify as very conservative. The simple slope for this group is positive and significant (b = 0.079, s.e. = 0.040, p = 0.049). When either (or both) conspiracy mentality or ideology are at different values, the effect of the Facebook fact-check treatment is not significant (see Figure 2).

Figure 3. Simple slopes, Facebook fact-check treatment, conspiracy mentality, and party identification This analysis indicated that our fact-check treatment increased perceptions of Facebook-related conspiracy beliefs, but primarily among Independents who either scored high or scored low on conspiracy mentality (see Figure 3). The fact-check treatment pushes these two groups in opposite directions: while Independents in the control condition closely resembled Republicans, they diverged substantially when exposed to the Facebook fact-check treatment. Specifically, those scoring highest on conspiracy mentality were more likely to agree with the statement that Facebook is manipulating the public through fact-checks (b = 0.181, s.e. = 0.077, p = 0.019), while those who scored lowest were less likely to agree with such a belief (b = −0.315, s.e. = 0.110, p = 0.004).

nice to be part of this multidisciplinary and international team led by Justin Phillips (nz), @timgravelle.bsky.social (ca), @acarson.bsky.social & me investigating whether facebook's 3rd party fact-checking increases #conspiracybelief

TLDR; it doesn't really.
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

Why do educated people fall for conspiracy theories? It could be narcissism New research shows highly educated people are just as likely to believe conspiracies as those with less education if they have these psychological traits.

nice piece on narcissism and conspiracy belief by @tylorcos.bsky.social

theconversation.com/why-do-educa...

Engaging with Conspiracy Theories, Fostering Democracy Conference: List of Abstracts published. - TaCT-FoRSED We are delighted by the enthusiastic response to our recent call for papers for the Engaging with Conspiracy Theories, Fostering Democracy conference we will

Great response to our CfP! Engaging with Conspiracy Theories, Fostering Democracy conference at @charlesuni.cuni.cz.

The scientific committee has met and selected abstracts:
tact-forsed.eu/2025/12/16/e...

Looking forward to it😀

#AcademicConference #ConspiracyTheories #DemocraticResilience

Magdalena Adamus, Jakub Šrol, Eva Ballová Mikušková, Jais Adam-Troian, Maria Chayinska Abstract The paper reports longitudinal analyses examining the extent to which institutional trust mediates the relationship between individuals' sense of precarity and their adherence to conspiracy beliefs. Across three waves, 925 participants (50.2% female) between the ages of 18 and 85 (M = 49.53; SD = 15.81) reported subjective appraisals of their financial situation (precarity), trust in institutions and adherence to conspiracy beliefs. The current study extends the previous analyses by including three-wave longitudinal data. The preregistered autoregressive cross-lagged panel model supports the notion that a sense of precarity follows adherence to conspiracy beliefs rather than preceding them, while institutional (dis)trust and conspiracy beliefs show a bidirectional pattern. However, the random-intercept cross-lagged panel model does not corroborate this, suggesting that the effects may be driven by stable between-person differences rather than actual within-person changes. Additionally, the latter model reveals two separate temporal patterns linking conspiracy beliefs with either the sense of precarity or institutional trust, opening the possibility that our results were driven by two distinct underlying mechanisms. The paper discusses the importance of longitudinal studies for a more accurate understanding of social-psychological realities in which conspiracy beliefs and suspicions of institutions may flourish.

Longitudinal analysis shows possible distinct patterns of associations between conspiracy beliefs and either institutional distrust or the sense of precarity

findings here suggest b/w person associations over time, rather than w/i changes

bpspsychub.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Does Being Confronted With Internal Attributions for an Ingroup’s Sufferings Foster the Endorsement of Conspiracy Theories? New in social psychology, from @kenzonera.bsky.social, Karen Douglas, @paulbertin.bsky.social, and @olivierklein.bsky.social doi.org/10.1525/coll...

We are really proud of our #NottsPsychPod team – incredible numbers in the Spotify 2025 wrapped:

-18 countries reached
-Our podcast growth outpaces 90% of other shows
-Fans listened for longer than 77% of other shows
-More shares than 83% of other shows

www.nottingham.ac.uk/psychology/o...

All you'll feel is doom and gloom: Multiple perspectives on the associations between economic anxiety and conspiracy beliefs The article investigates whether and how adherence to conspiracy beliefs (CBs) about COVID-19 pandemic might be associated with (and cause) economic anxiety over various cultural settings and time.…

#Research in Political Psychology (@wiley.com) investigated the link between believing in conspiracy theories and economic anxiety.

A group of academics led by Magdalena Adamus (Masaryk University 🇨🇿) assessed our Round 10 (2020-22) #data to explore whether these is an association.

Are people who believe in #conspiracy theories mentally ill?

#conspiracytheories #psychology #pathology #mentalillness

Screenshot of the abstract for the article "If only I had not fallen down the rabbit hole: Counterfactual thinking reduces engagement with conspiracy theories" in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology.

New paper out in @jexpsocpsych.bsky.social !

We (@kwinter.bsky.social, @kaiepstude.bsky.social , Bob Fennis and I) found that encouraging counterfactual thinking reduces engagement with conspiracy theories (i.e., clicks on, and reading times for, conspiracy articles).

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Call for papers for International Conference organised by TaCT-FoRSED! - TaCT-FoRSED * CALL FOR PAPERS * Deadline: December 5th, 2025 *

📢 Final call for papers! Engaging with Conspiracy Theories, Fostering Democracy — Prague, 9–10 Apr 2026.

Submit by THIS FRIDAY 5 Dec 2025!

Topics: #ConspiracyTheories, #Disinformation, #Democracy and more!

👉👉 tact-forsed.eu/2025/10/07/c.... #AcademicConference

The Impact of Freedom of Speech on Conspiracy Beliefs Conspiracy beliefs are often portrayed as a threat to democracies. However, less is known about the extent to which the state of democracy may affect conspiracy beliefs. Hence, we investigated the im...

🚨 New paper out in the European Journal of Social Psychology!

Across one study using aggregated nation-level data and four preregistered experiments, we examined how freedom of speech within a society influences belief in conspiracy theories.

Missed Series 2 of Notts Psych Pod? 🎧

Catch up now, wherever you get your podcasts:
👉 creators.spotify.com/pod/profile/...

Each series explores how psychology connects with real-world issues — from neurodiversity to community engagement — putting people at the centre of research.

“Knowing what I don’t know” – belief in conspiracy theories relates to lower metacognitive sensitivity: a signal detection theoretic approach Beliefs in conspiracy theories are seemingly hard to dispute through facts. Researchers have partly attributed this resistance to certain information processing styles that are associated with cons...

Why are some people more prone to believe in conspiracy theories? Part of the answer may lie in metacognition, i.e., the ability to correctly estimate one's own knowledge about topics.
-> New paper with @kwinter.bsky.social, @kaisassenberg.bsky.social & Helen Fischer
🔗 doi.org/10.1080/2044...

Our registered report on the impact of using norms as a lever against vaccination misinformation @collabrapsychology.bsky.social online.ucpress.edu/collabra/art...

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Just asking questions – How conspiracy theories took hold in Britain <p>Conspiracy theories used to be confined to fringe internet discussions and the guy you’d avoid in the pub. Now, thanks to figures like Donald Trump, ...

fantastic pod with @drdanieljolley.bsky.social about the psychology behind conspiracy theories. impressive coverage of a lot of topics including what, who, and the why of conspiracy theories as well as some tips on how to engage with ppl who believe them.

Landing page for our article "Fighting fire with fire: Prebunking with the use of a plausible meta-conspiracy framing" published in the British Journal of Psychology

🚨New open access paper out in BJP special issue "Psychological Understanding of Misinformation and Disinformation in the Face of Environmental Crises"!

“Fighting fire with fire: Prebunking with the use of a plausible meta-conspiracy framing” 🧵👇 1/12
📖 doi.org/10.1111/bjop...

Experts reveal how to change a conspiracy theorist’s mind Did Dezi Freeman really kill two police officers or was he framed by the Government? This is one question being posed on a Facebook group for last weekend’s March for Australia anti-immigration rallie...

"The danger isn’t just the extreme cases — it’s the slow erosion of social trust"

some informed opinions on this featuring experts in the space including @ulliecker.bsky.social @drdanieljolley.bsky.social

From pub chatter to prime time: conspiracy theories are everywhere. But where’s the line between healthy scepticism and believing the Royals are lizards?

Today, @alexvont.bsky.social & @drdanieljolley.bsky.social dig into why Britain fell for conspiracy thinking.

🎧 linktr.ee/bunker_pod

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This Age Group Is Most Likely To Fall For Conspiracy Theories (It's Not Who You Think) The researchers of a new study were 'quite surprised' that it was this group most likely to fall prey to conspiracy beliefs such as QAnon and the flat Earth theory.

If you assumed the answer might be Boomers, you’re not alone. The researchers behind the study said they figured that would be the case, too.

"[Our findings go] against the typical stereotype of the older uncle at the Christmas table exposing the latest conspiracy theories,” the co-author told me.

I'm looking forward to giving a Keynote on our work studying the psychology of conspiracy theories at this event 👇

mmmworkshop.cs.ru.nl

The Interplay Between Economic Hardship, Anomie, and Conspiracy Beliefs in Shaping Anti‐Immigrant Sentiment As hostility toward immigrants grows, it is essential to explore the psychological factors that contribute to anti-immigrant attitudes. Although the impact of economic hardship, societal anomie, and ...

💰 Economic hardship, anomie, and anti-immigrant attitudes

Six studies found that economic hardship can fuel anti-immigrant sentiment, partly via societal decline perceptions and conspiracy beliefs.

🔗 doi.org/10.1111/jasp...

#SciComm 🧪 #Psychology

Worsening economic conditions fuel anti-immigrant conspiracy beliefs and support for violence Belief in anti-immigrant conspiracies may be fueled by financial hardship and a sense of societal breakdown, according to new research. Across six studies, economic stress predicted support for discriminatory policies and even violent actions against non-European immigrants.

Worsening economic conditions fuel anti-immigrant conspiracy beliefs and support for violence

🎉 That’s a wrap on Series 2 of Notts Psych Pod!

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Huge thanks to our brilliant editor @graceebaranowski, host Dr Daniel Jolley, & producer @neuro_rachel.

And a big shout-out to our amazing guests!

A powerful clip from today's episode 👇

Listen to #NottsPsychPod wherever you listen to your podcasts: creators.spotify.com/pod/profile/...