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, the 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.

The 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 shapes human social life.

Joseph P. Forgas is Scientia Professor of Psychology at the University of New South Wales, Australia. He received his D.Phil. and D.Sc. from the University of Oxford and his research focuses on affective influences on social cognition and behaviour. He published over 30 books and 300 papers and for his work he received the Order of Australia, the Distinguished Scientific Contribution Award as well as a number of academic fellowships and honours.