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Conspiracy theorists don’t realize they’re on the fringe

It's not that believers in conspiracy theories are massively overconfident; there is no data on that, because the studies didn't set out to quantify the degree of overconfidence, per Pennycook. Rather, "They're overconfident, and they massively overestimate how much people agree with them," he said. Ars spoke with Pennycook to learn more. Ars Technica: Why did you decide to investigate overconfidence as a contributing factor to believing conspiracies? Gordon Pennycook: There's a popular sense

Conspiracy theorists unaware their beliefs are on the fringe

Overconfidence is a hallmark trait of people who believe in conspiracies, and they also significantly overestimate how much others agree with them, Cornell psychology researchers have found. The study indicates that belief in conspiracies may be less about a person’s needs and motivations and more about their failure to recognize that they might be wrong. Conspiracy believers not only consistently overestimated their performance on numeracy and perception tests, revealing they tend to be less a