People who believe in COVID-19 conspiracies more likely to contract it: Study

A Dutch study published in the Cambridge University Press suggests that people who believe in COVID-19 conspiracy theories are more likely to be infected with the COVID-19. The study also mentions that this group of people are more likely to break coronavirus rules, which can lead to social rejection, job loss, lower income and a general decline in well-being, as per the reports of Business Insider.

The study's authors, from Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, stated that one basic property of conspiracy theories is that they are consequential. The authors further said that even if a conspiracy theory is extremely implausible according to logic or scientific evidence, if it appears real to a perceiver, it has a genuine impact on attitudes, emotions and behaviour.

The researchers surveyed 5,745 people in April and December 2020

The study's researchers surveyed 5,745 people in April and December 2020, led by the first author and social psychologist Jan-Willem van Prooijen, to obtain a broad sample from a cross-section of Dutch society. The study concluded by stating that conspiracy beliefs predict how effectively people cope with the obstacles of a worldwide pandemic, which has significant ramifications for private and public health and perceivers' economic and social well-being.

In the survey, people were asked a series of questions early in April 2020 to see their level of belief in COVID-19 conspiracy theories, such as whether they believed the coronavirus was a bioweapon engineered by scientists or a cover-up for the impending global economic crash. Several months later, the same group was polled again, this time on whether they would ever be tested for the virus, whether the test resulted in a positive or negative result and whether they'd ever broken COVID-19 restrictions. According to ScienceAlert, the findings revealed that the people who believed in COVID-19 conspiracy theories were predicted to be tested positive for the virus after doing a COVID-19 test on the people who did not hold such views.

Conspiracy theories are frequently adopted at times of heightened anxiety

According to Business Insider, Geoffrey Dancy, a conspiracy theory scholar said that conspiracy theories are frequently adopted at times of heightened anxiety to explain occurrences beyond control. He added that having something or someone to blame for a massive catastrophe like a pandemic might be soothing. He also said that conspiracies have a lot of power because people can offer them immediately and point to someone to blame for issues.

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