Madeleine Weast — Study Finds Democrats Are More Likely To Fall For Media Hoaxes After Election Loss

A new study shows that an increasing amount of Democrats are likely to embrace conspiracy theories in the media after losing the 2016 election.

Brendan Nyhan, a professor of government at Dartmouth, penned an op-ed in the New York Times Feb. 15 elaborating on a study from the American Press Institute (API) by political scientists Christina Farhart, Joanne Miller and Kyle Saunders, who study conspiracy theory belief.

The study, entitled "Conspiracy Endorsement as Motivated Reasoning: The Moderating Roles of Political Knowledge and Trust," compares how Republicans and Democrats changed their responses to a conspiracy predispositions scale.

According to Nyhan, the research "suggests that people embrace conspiracy beliefs as a way to cope with perceived threats to control."

The scale used in the API study was created by Joseph E. Uscinski and Joseph M. Parent of the University of Miami for their own study, which declares people are more susceptible to conspiracy theory belief when they face "group threats."...

The reason I posted a link to this is because I have noticed that apparently smart and well-informed Democrats, rank and file, politicians and operatives, and office holders, seem to have checked their brains lately and operating from emotion, or being disingenuous to attack Donald Trump and his cohort, which they view as un-American. Apparently, they are being affected by cognitive dissonance if this study has legs. Anyway, it is bizarre.

Washington Free Beacon
Study Finds Democrats Are More Likely To Fall For Media Hoaxes After Election Loss

Madeleine Weast, Assistant Social Media Editor for the Washington Free Beacon and formerly a Communications Fellow at The Charles Koch Institute