Ideological Susceptibility to Pseudo-Profound Bullshit

Researchers in Sweden have looked at susceptibility of liberal and conservative people to pseudo-profound bullshit, which are statements and arguments that seem to be insightful or meaningful but are meaningless. An example is the statement “we are in the midst of a high-frequency blossoming of interconnectedness that will give us access to the quantum soup itself.” That's definitely meaningless.

The researchers write for the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin journal: “This research systematically mapped the relationship between political ideology and receptivity to pseudo-profound bullshit—that is, obscure sentences constructed to impress others rather than convey truth. Among Swedish adults (N = 985), bullshit receptivity was (a) robustly positively associated with socially conservative (vs. liberal) self-placement, resistance to change, and particularly binding moral intuitions (loyalty, authority, purity); (b) associated with centrism on preference for equality and even leftism (when controlling for other aspects of ideology) on economic ideology self-placement; and (c) lowest among right-of-center social liberal voters and highest among left-wing green voters. Most of the results held up when we controlled for the perceived profundity of genuine aphorisms, cognitive reflection, numeracy, information processing bias, gender, age, education, religiosity, and spirituality. The results are supportive of theoretical accounts that posit ideological asymmetries in cognitive orientation, while also pointing to the existence of bullshit receptivity among both right- and left-wingers.”

A prior discussion here pointed out that political ideology tends to lead people to false beliefs and unsound reasoning or logic. The cause and effect relationship isn't clear, but there is a correlation between strong ideological beliefs and a tendency to read into rhetoric, facts and truths realities that accord with the ideology even if that leads to distortion and false beliefs.

One of the authors of the research commented: “I think that the notion of pseudo-profound bullshit specifically caught my attention because I have a background in philosophy and an aversion to unclear statements. Understanding how bullshit operates also struck me as particularly urgent in our current digital age, in which fake news, conspiracy theories, and ‘alternative facts’ may have greater destructive potential than ever — although people have probably engaged in bullshitting for thousands of years.” The researcher also commented that “on the left, it may stem from an uncritical openness to ideas that sound ideologically appealing or familiar; on the right, it may stem from a disinclination to critically engage with information and its sources.”

It is probably true that people have engaged in BSing for thousands of years. The historical record and modern times are full of examples. The researcher noted that his interest was in trying to promote scientific thinking regardless of differences in worldview. The research was conducted among Swedes, but presumably the data can be extrapolated at least to Westerners, if not everyone. Follow-up studies will be needed to confirm these findings and further explain the situation.