What makes a conspiracy theorist?

Questioning accounts

Theorists often point to history, which offers numerous examples of conspiracies, covert operations, disinformation campaigns, assassinations, and government schemes, the details of which only emerged years later. Likewise, questioning official accounts does not in itself make someone a conspiracy theorist, just as institutions are not immune to lying or concealing information. The difference lies in the evidence.

Scientific, journalistic, or judicial scepticism begins with a question, seeks verifiable evidence, and remains open to revising its conclusions if new evidence emerges. Closed conspiratorial thinking, by contrast, begins with a conclusion, then reinterprets information to reinforce that. Once people form a particular belief, they tend to give greater weight to information that supports it and actively seek out such information, while becoming less receptive to evidence that challenges its validity.

After enough self-reinforcement, others' denial of the theory is treated as evidence in its favour. Denials are treated as cover-ups, and the absence of evidence is treated as concealment. In this way, the theory becomes a closed system that is difficult to test. Supporting evidence confirms it, contradictory evidence shows that conspirators are hiding the truth, while a lack of evidence means the truth has been erased. In other words, every avenue to a different conclusion is closed.

The 2025 review identified three broad categories of motivation associated with conspiracy beliefs: epistemic motivations linked to understanding and certainty, existential motivations associated with safety and control, and social motivations linked to perceptions of oneself and one's group. The strength of these associations was generally moderate and similar, and the researchers found considerable variation between studies.

Fear and loss of control

When people feel they have little control over their lives, or that the world around them has become unpredictable, explanations that offer meaning and order can appeal. As such, conspiracies flourish during wars, economic crises, political upheavals, disasters, and epidemics, because a crisis is often accompanied by incomplete information and a rapidly changing scenario. The covid-19 pandemic illustrated this dynamic. As scientists were learning about the new virus, narratives emerged alleging secret plots both around the 'manufacture' and spread of the disease, and around the vaccines for it. Claims of population control and mass surveillance spread online.

A study published in Frontiers in Social Psychology in January 2025 used data from 2,883 people in Germany. Psychological characteristics and levels of political trust had been measured before the pandemic, and participants' beliefs in covid conspiracy theories were then assessed during the crisis. The researchers found that a greater need for cognitive closure was associated with a slightly higher tendency to accept conspiracy narratives.

The stronger relationship, however, concerned trust. Higher levels of trust in political institutions before the pandemic, along with trust in political and medical institutions during the crisis, were associated with weaker conspiracy beliefs. The researchers found no support for the hypothesis that the relationship between the need for cognitive closure and conspiracy beliefs necessarily depended on levels of political trust. They also emphasised that the study's correlational design could not, on its own, establish the direction of any causal relationship between trust and conspiracy beliefs.

A question of trust

Trust differs across societies. A study published in 2024 compared the relationship between conspiracy beliefs, trust, and attitudes towards Covid vaccines in the US, UK, and Brazil. It involved 538 participants whose responses were collected in September and October 2021. The researchers found an association between stronger conspiracy beliefs and more negative attitudes towards vaccination, but the role of trust in political leaders and institutions differed across countries.

The study pointed to the importance of local political contexts, since messages issued by political leaders can influence the relationship between trust and health information. Simply telling people to trust institutions was inadequate. The more important question was whether those institutions deserve trust, whether they provide transparent and verifiable information, and how they respond to their own mistakes and contradictions.

If belief in conspiracy theories were driven solely by a lack of information, the solution would be to provide it. Yet the research suggests that there are other factors at play, including feelings of safety, control, belonging, and trust. Someone who has found in a conspiracy theory an answer to their fears or powerlessness will not necessarily abandon it simply because data or official statements suggest they should, especially if they distrust the source.

Scepticism is no bad thing. Indeed, it is fundamental to science and journalism. Many public interest stories would never have surfaced if people hadn't challenged official accounts and demanded evidence. But methodical scepticism differs from cynicism. The former asks what could prove or disprove the hypothesis; the latter sees everything as evidence of a conspiracy.

Addressing the problem of conspiracies requires more than the correction of false claims after they have spread. Clarity, access to data, early acknowledgement of uncertainty, public correction of mistakes, and the preservation of public trust all help reduce the conditions in which conspiracy theories flourish. Education is also important, in particular around the difference between asking legitimate questions and reaching predetermined conclusions.