Contributed Talk Sessions | Poster Sessions | All Posters | Search Papers

Poster Session C: Friday, August 15, 2:00 – 5:00 pm, de Brug & E‑Hall

Perceiving patterns under uncertainty: the role of conspiratorial thinking

Yi-Chuang Lin¹, Lisa Marieke Kluen²; ¹California Institute of Technology, ²McLean Hospital

Presenter: Yi-Chuang Lin

Conspiratorial thinking, among other things, is associated with a tendency to perceive patterns in ambiguity and jump to conclusions. In a visual pattern detection task (N = 406), participants were faster and more accurate when identifying object images compared to noise, confirming sensitivity to true signals. Participants with higher conspiracy beliefs identified more objects in noise trials, and responded faster in both object and noise trials. Drift diffusion modeling revealed that higher conspiracy scores were associated with reduced boundary separation, indicating lower decision thresholds. These results suggest that individuals who believe in conspiracy theories tend to accumulate less evidence before decision-making, confirming a tendency to jump to conclusions.

Topic Area: Object Recognition & Visual Attention

Extended Abstract: Full Text PDF