Amazon.com: Customer reviews: Conspiracy Theories and the People Who Believe Them

Top positive review

Academic and thorough

Reviewed in the United States on July 3, 2019

This book is very helpful to understand the world of conspiracy theories and how to work with it. Numerous contributors, mostly academics, share differing viewpoints, personal experiences, and ideas. If you want a discussion and analysis of specific conspiracy theories, look elsewhere. This book gets into psychology, behavior, and essential role of conspiracy theories in a free society.

17 people found this helpful

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Lee. Osborne

trolling

Reviewed in the United States on May 3, 2021

Thinking too often goes that people touting consp. theories are serious. In reality they are trolls having fun laughing at others who take them seriously and challenge them. It's hard to believe someone can be so stupid as to think we didn't go to the moon or that the earth is flat.

One person found this helpful

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From the United States

Daniel D.

Academic and thorough

Reviewed in the United States on July 3, 2019

Verified Purchase

17 people found this helpful

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rreader10

Interesting academic perspective on the topic

Reviewed in the United States on September 26, 2020

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Certainly worth reading, although I found myself reading more about the subject than my interest in it would warrant.

One thing that is clear from this book is that, no matter how academic and objective you try to be, it's hard to paint a nice picture of conspiracy theories and theorists. It's a pathetic world.

3 people found this helpful

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W. Straka

Excellent! Very Thorough Treatment

Reviewed in the United States on August 15, 2021

Verified Purchase

This book provided a very thorough treatment of conspiracy theories in society. My only regret is that it was published before QAnon and it’s came into being. That would have provided an interesting chapter subject.

I find this an excellent non-ideological approach to looking at conspiracy theories and theorists.

One person found this helpful

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Fred Dorfman

For a better understaning

Reviewed in the United States on October 29, 2020

Verified Purchase

Very good in explaining why we have such a large number of conspiracies going around these days

One person found this helpful

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Lee. Osborne

trolling

Reviewed in the United States on May 3, 2021

One person found this helpful

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Tom Fulery

Comprehensive and academic study of conspiracy theories and those who fall for them

Reviewed in the United States on April 16, 2021

A very comprehensive, detailed, academic study of conspiracy theories and the kind of people who fall for them. Unfortunately, it goes far beyond the average American's ability to grasp – which is OK because it is also priced far beyond the average American's ability to afford.

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Gloria Proa

Like NEW

Reviewed in the United States on October 16, 2020

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Book was in Great Condition

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W& E. Black

Great stuff if you're interested in people rather than conspiracy...

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 21, 2019

This is a series of papers given at an academic conference a couple of years ago and so the papers range fro 'dry as dust' statistics to gut wrenching accounts of what happens when a respected academic casually tells some conspiracy nutter that he's nuts...

It's a a big long book, best read episodically rather than as a narrative, but there is an issue with that. The index is dreadful but I gather this is often the case with pre publication version of a book. The annotations and foot notes are superb...
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It's essentially in three parts, the first third defines the people involved statistically, the second on how these things both start and spread and the third looks at the senior figures involved but nobody actually sas that the men, and interestingly they all seem to be men, are barking mad, and, incredibly, this includes David Eyck, a man notorious for being followed by an audience that usually feels more at home in a comedy club...

No mention of vast government conspiracies, possibly because there is already a seemingly respectable branch of academia busy chasing the doing of the intelligence services, and, of course, intelligence agencies do actually exist, which may well be untrue for the Illuminati and an assortment of others...

Anyway, the next time you're wandering through the wilder outreaches of YouTube or facebook this will pretty much let you know who it is you're dealing with, if you're prepared to spend £19 to find out...

5 people found this helpful

C. O'Brien

Very dense - but full of fascinating nuggets

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on April 9, 2019

In the preface to this long book, editor Joseph Uscinski expresses the wish that you will "read the volume from start to finish". I think that's a vain hope, and I think he's aware of that - hence the dry little joke. This isn't an unfolding narrative history of the growth of conspiracy theory in the modern world so much as a collection of disparate essays by a variety of academics, all of whom have a different viewpoint and different specific interests.

As such, it's actually ideal for dipping into. None of the essays are long enough to be totally intimidating, though some are dry and heavy on statistics. I'd advise combing the contents section and looking for topics that interest you; it really doesn't matter in which order you read the essays. Although the editor is an American political science specialist, not all the content is US-centric: there are sections on the UK, Europe and post-Soviet Russia as well as general social and psychological theory which could apply to anywhere.

Some of my own favourites were Bristol University scientist Stephan Lewandowsky's essay on climate change sceptics and the conspiracy theories and aggressive trolling which the subject attracts, and American political scientist Steven Smallpage's "Conspiracy Thinking, Tolerance and Democracy" which examines issues around society's ability to tolerate outlandish and unusual points of view. The opening chapter by Uscinski, "Down the Rabbit Hole We Go!" is an entertaining but academically rigorous explanation of why the subject is important: as he states at the outset, "those who believe the system is rigged will be less willing to take part in it"., leading to the erosion of belief in democratic forms of government and a rise in populism.

Modern social media obviously has a major part to play in this, and so it's odd to find that the term doesn't appear in the disappointingly sketchy and incomplete index. Many of the essays deal with the role of social media platforms in the spread of conspiracy theories and fake news, so this does seem a particularly odd omission - perhaps the index in the reading copy I have is not the final version.

On the whole, this is not an easy read, but taken slowly and explored gradually, it's a very rewarding one.

5 people found this helpful

jcmacc

A very timely look at conspiracy theories, their followers and their impact

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 5, 2021

Current politics around the world is driven by conspiracy theories to an extent that's fairly frightening. While many are about partisan politics (accusing the opposition of nefarious deeds), others are focused on science and social policy with anti-vaccination being of key importance at the moment given that pseudo-scientific objections to vaccines will prolong a global pandemic leading to more deaths. This book is an excellent collection of articles and research papers on conspiracies theories, their impacts and - in particular - the psychology of why conspiracy-based thinking is so important to many people.

The various articles take an interesting set of positions (e.g. one questions if we really should reject conspiracy-based ideas out of hand) and cover issues around the world but with a focus on the US and the West. At a time when bizarre Q-Anon believers are becoming US elected representatives it's easy to believe conspiracy-based politics is a new social-media driven phenomenon but the book is excellent at showing that much within current politics represents a trend for what's always been there, based on constants within human psychology and based on the same types of misinformation and manipulation that have been used for decades or more.

Recommended.

One person found this helpful

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