Seeking evidence and explanation signals religious and scientific commitments

Lay epistemology and the Populist's playbook: The roles of epistemological identity and expressive epistemology

Salient social identities have long appeared to shape what we believe and know. But do social identities also shape how we know? This essay argues that performances of "lay epistemology" by populist leaders may shape group norms in ways that encourage supporters to orient to their worlds more through intuition and emotion and less through evidence and data (or at least to report that they do, thus constituting a form of "expressive epistemology"). We summarize research on the positive link between populist attitudes, valuing intuition and emotion over evidence and data, and belief in misinformation and conspiracy theories, and then explore how these relationships may be mutually reinforcing - and strategically beneficial to populist leaders.

Updating the identity-based model of belief: From false belief to the spread of misinformation

The spread of misinformation threatens democratic societies, hampering informed decision-making. Partisan identity biases perceptions of reality, promoting false beliefs. The Identity-based Model of Political Belief explains how social identity shapes information processing and contributes to misinformation. According to this model, social identity goals can override accuracy goals, leading to belief alignment with party members rather than facts. We propose an extended version of this model that incorporates the role of informational context in misinformation belief and sharing. Partisanship involves cognitive and motivational aspects that shape party members' beliefs and actions. This includes whether they seek further evidence, where they seek that evidence, and which sources they trust. Understanding the interplay between social identity and accuracy is crucial in addressing misinformation.

Lay standards for reasoning predict people's acceptance of suspect claims

People vary between each other and across contexts with respect to how important it is to them to think in logical, impartial, and evidence-based ways. Recent studies demonstrate that this variation in people's personal standards for thinking predicts the nature and quality of their beliefs. Strong commitments to epistemic virtues motivate careful thinking and protect people from suspicious claims. At the same time, people are more likely to knowingly hold biased or evidentially unsupported beliefs when they think that they are justified to think in biased or evidentially poor ways. People's personal standards for reasoning likely play an important role in shaping how suspect or unreasonable information is received.

Distinct Profiles for Beliefs About Religion Versus Science

A growing body of research suggests that scientific and religious beliefs are often held and justified in different ways. In three studies with 707 participants, we examine the distinctive profiles of beliefs in these domains. In Study 1, we find that participants report evidence and explanatory considerations (making sense of things) as dominant reasons for beliefs across domains. However, cuing the religious domain elevates endorsement of nonscientific justifications for belief, such as ethical considerations (e.g., believing it encourages people to be good), affiliation (what loved ones believe), and intuition (what feels true in one's heart). Study 2 replicates these differences with specific scientific and religious beliefs held with equal confidence, and documents further domain differences in beliefs' personal importance, openness to revision, and perceived objectivity. Study 3 replicates these differences, further finding that counter-consensus beliefs about contentious science topics (such as climate change and vaccination) often have properties resembling religious beliefs, while counter-religious beliefs about religion (e.g., "There is no God") have properties that more closely resemble beliefs about science. We suggest that beliefs are held and justified within coherent epistemic frameworks, with individuals using different frameworks in different contexts and domains.