Conclusion

In the conclusion, we give a brief overview of the guiding principles of the book and a “handbook” of some suggested solutions for combatting science denialism while keeping psychology and emotion in mind.

Introduction

In 2014, a deadly epidemic of Ebola hemorrhagic fever ravaged three countries in West Africa. While the disease barely hit the United States, it caused widespread panic that sometimes threatened the safety of African immigrants in the United States. Five years later, a global pandemic of a novel coronavirus, later named COVID-19, quickly picked up speed around the world. In the face of a serious and very real threat, many Americans ignored the warnings and a vocal minority even insisted that the pandemic was not real. While the particulars of each of these examples might be quite different, they have something very important in common: science denial. This introductory chapter provides an overview of how such widespread science denialist views come into existence and how they spread. The authors outline the eight chapters of this book, which go into depth on different psychological mechanisms behind this phenomenon. Finally, they provide a preview of some of the solutions we have devised in response to this grave problem.

Causality and Filling the Ignorance Gap

This chapter evaluates uncertainty and why people feel the need to fill the ignorance gap. The tendency to want to know why things are as they are and figuring out what caused what often leads people to incorrect or even dangerous scientific conclusions. The chapter argues that it is highly adaptive to know how to attribute causality but that people are often too quick to do so. This is another instance in which adaptive, evolutionary qualities have done people a disservice in the face of complex debates and rational thinking. In particular, people have a difficult time sitting with uncertainty and an especially hard time accepting coincidence. The chapter then considers the evidence from decades of psychological research showing people’s misunderstanding of cause and effect and the elaborate coping mechanisms they have developed as a result. It also suggests some ways to help people better comprehend true causality, without diminishing their ability to attribute cause when it is in fact appropriate.

Avoidance of Complexity

This chapter describes another reason people succumb to unscientific notions—the discomfort people have with complexity. It is not that people are incapable of learning the facts but rather they are reluctant to put in the time and effort to do so. This retreat from complexity is similar to the other reasons for science denial in that it is in many ways a useful and adaptive stance. But when making health decisions, the inability to tackle scientific details can leave one prone to accepting craftily packaged inaccuracies and slogans. Scientists, doctors, and public health experts are often not helpful in this regard because they frequently refuse to explain things clearly and interestingly. The chapter then argues that scientists need to work much harder on figuring out the best ways to communicate facts to non-scientists. It proposes some possible methods to make scientific thinking more intuitive. By focusing on the scientific method, one can begin to educate people about how to accept complexity and uncertainty, how to be skeptical, and how to ask the right questions.

Confirmation Bias

This chapter examines confirmation bias, which refers to people’s tendency to attend only to information that agrees with what they already think is true. Confirmation bias is responsible for not only a great deal of denial of scientific evidence but also the actual generation and maintenance of incorrect scientific information. That is, scientific and medical professionals are as prone as anyone else is to “seeing what we believe,” making it especially difficult to help people sort out what is true science from the mistakes and outright fabrications. The chapter demonstrates how confirmation bias, although a highly adaptive human trait, often causes scientific misperceptions due to resistance to the often counterintuitive disconfirmation process of scientific inquiry. It then proposes some ways of countering confirmation bias.

Charismatic Leaders

This chapter discusses the second factor in promoting science denial: charismatic leaders, who are perhaps the biggest and most formidable opponents to rational understanding and acceptance of scientific evidence in the health field. It looks at several profiles of leaders of anti-science movements and attempts to identify common denominators among them. Although they may be true believers, most of them are people who should know better, who often distort the truth, and who may masquerade as selfless but in fact gain considerable personal benefit from promulgating false ideas. And, most important, what they do harms people. Ultimately, there is a fascinating, albeit at times a bit frightening, psychology behind the appeal of these charismatic leaders that may help in neutralizing their hold over others.

The Attack on Health and Science Institutions

One of our most trusted sources of accurate scientific information has always been the federal and international scientific regulatory agencies charged with protecting and improving our health and safety. These include the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the World Health Organization (WHO). After being chronically underfunded for many years, these agencies have been assaulted by anti-science forces within the previous United States federal administration. Today, many people have lost what was once a very high level of confidence in these agencies. It will be a difficult, but far from impossible, task for a new federal administration to restore them to the positions of trust they once held.

Risk Perception and Probability

This chapter studies the psychology of risk perception, starting with an overview of classic risk perception theory. When it comes to health, people are intolerant of risks of harm that feel uncontrollable while they are perfectly content to accept risks that they perceive are within their control, even if these perceptions are incorrect. These dangerous health misperceptions fall under the psychological category called “uncontrollable risk.” The chapter assesses the question of why many statistically improbable risks seem much more relevant to people than statistically probable ones. It then looks at some of the heuristics and biases that affect risk perception. People’s brains are not designed for linear risk perception even though that is how the world really is. Recognizing this is a crucial step in correcting mistakes when making health decisions and in planning interventions to help people make those decisions on a scientific basis.

Science Denial in Crisis

In 2019, a historic pandemic erupted due to a disease we would later know as COVID-19. Millions of people around the world quarantined in their homes as healthcare systems became quickly overwhelmed and death tolls rose. At the same time, the World Health Organization (WHO) proclaimed that we were facing another simultaneous crisis: a crisis of misinformation, which the WHO called an “infodemic.” Unfortunately, this dual crisis was not specific to the coronavirus pandemic but is something that can be seen across history in other epidemics. This chapter explores the question of what happens to our now familiar notion of science denial during a crisis, arguing that many of the same principles that we discuss throughout this book are at play in a more heightened manner. We will end by proposing some possible solutions to the misinformation crisis that so often coincides with times of public health crisis.

Conspiracy Theories

This chapter addresses the complicated topic of conspiracy theories. This topic is complicated because a conspiracy theory is not prima facie wrong. Yet one of the hallmarks of false scientific beliefs is the claim by their adherents that they are the victims of profiteering, deceit, and cover-ups by conglomerates variously composed of large corporations, government regulatory agencies, the media, and professional medical societies. The trick is to figure out if the false ones can be readily separated from those in which there may be some truth. Only by carefully analyzing a number of such conspiracy theories and their adherents does it become possible to offer some guidelines as to which are most obviously incorrect. The chapter then studies the psychology of conspiracy theory adherence. It argues that belittling people who come to believe in false conspiracy theories as ignorant or mean-spirited is perhaps the surest route to reinforcing an anti-science position.