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Victims of Conspiracies? An Examination of the Relationship Between Conspiracy Beliefs and Dispositional Individual Victimhood

Research output: Journal contributions › Journal articles › Research › peer-review

Authors

  • Author collaboration of "Victims of Conspiracies"
  • Daniel Toribio-Flórez
  • Marlene S. Altenmüller
  • Karen M. Douglas
  • Mario Gollwitzer
  • Indro Adinugroho
  • Oliver Genschow
  • Mareike Westfal

Conspiracy beliefs have been linked to perceptions of collective victimhood. We adopt an individual perspective on victimhood by investigating the relationship between conspiracy beliefs and the individual disposition to perceive and react to injustice as a victim, i.e., victim justice sensitivity (VJS). Data from two German samples (Ns = 370, 373) indicated a positive association between VJS and conspiracy mentality beyond conceptually related covariates (e.g., mistrust). In a multinational sample from 15 countries (N = 14,978), VJS was positively associated with both general and specific conspiracy beliefs (about vaccines and climate change) within countries, though these associations varied across countries. However, economic, sociopolitical and cultural country-level factors that might explain the cross-country variability (e.g., GDP, Human Freedom Index, individualism–collectivism), including indices of collective exposure to direct violence, did not moderate the studied associations. Future research should investigate the relationship between victimhood and conspiracy beliefs, considering both intraindividual and intergroup perspectives.

Original languageEnglish
JournalEuropean Journal of Social Psychology
Number of pages18
ISSN0046-2772
DOIs
Publication statusAccepted/In press - 2025

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2025 The Author(s). European Journal of Social Psychology published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

    Research areas

  • conspiracy beliefs, conspiracy theories, victim justice sensitivity, victimhood

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DOI