The Psychology of False Beliefs : Collective Delusions and Conspiracy Theories

This insightful book outlines the social psychology of false beliefs and tribal delusions, examining the common human tendency to create and maintain collectively shared belief systems that are have no foundation in reality. Bringing together leading international researchers, this book explores how evolutionary, biological, cognitive, and social variables shape the creation and maintenance of widely shared but obviously false belief systems. It explores how psychological processes promote the formation and maintenance of fallacious beliefs and discusses the philosophical and epistemological criteria we can use to classify some beliefs as false, and others as true.

The chapters draw on many core areas of contemporary social life where false beliefs are of topical interest, highlighting the applied implications of this line of research. Topics include political polarisation, false narratives about group differences, pandemic conspiracy theories, fallacious theories in academia and the role of the media and the internet in creating distorted narratives.

This book is engagingly written and will be of great interest to students and researchers in social psychology and the social sciences, as well as anyone seeking to understand one of the most intriguing issues that shape human social life.