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Conspiratorial Beliefs About COVID-19 Pandemic - Can They Pose a Mental Health Risk? The Relationship Between Conspiracy Thinking and the Symptoms of Anxiety and Depression Among Adult Poles
The aim of the study was to describe the relationship between the tendency to believe in false information about the COVID-19 pandemic, tendency to believe in conspiracy theories and the severity of anxiety and depression symptoms among the surveyed Poles. The study was conducted via the Internet in...
Autores principales: | , , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
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Frontiers Media S.A.
2022
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9209766/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35747099 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyt.2022.870128 |
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author | Dȩbski, Paweł Boroń, Adrianna Kapuśniak, Natalia Dȩbska-Janus, Małgorzata Piegza, Magdalena Gorczyca, Piotr |
author_facet | Dȩbski, Paweł Boroń, Adrianna Kapuśniak, Natalia Dȩbska-Janus, Małgorzata Piegza, Magdalena Gorczyca, Piotr |
author_sort | Dȩbski, Paweł |
collection | PubMed |
description | The aim of the study was to describe the relationship between the tendency to believe in false information about the COVID-19 pandemic, tendency to believe in conspiracy theories and the severity of anxiety and depression symptoms among the surveyed Poles. The study was conducted via the Internet in a group of 700 people aged 24.8 ± 6.3 years (mean ± SD). 585 females and 110 males were involved. Scales such as Generic Conspiracist Beliefs Scale (GCBS), Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS) and the original questionnaire COVID-19 Conspiratorial Beliefs Scale (COVID-19 CBS) designed to measure the tendency to believe in false information about COVID-19 pandemic were used. A positive correlation was observed between the tendency to believe in false information about the COVID-19 pandemic (COVID-19 CBS) and the tendency to believe in general conspiracy theories (GCBS) (r = 0.768; p < 0.001). Moreover, both COVID-19 CBS and GCBS positively correlated with the severity of anxiety and depression symptoms in the study group. For COVID-19 CBS, the correlation coefficients were 0.087 (p < 0.021) and.108 (p < 0.004) for depressive and anxiety symptoms, respectively, while for GCBS the coefficients were 0.132 (p < 0.001) and 0.147 (p < 0.001). Regression analysis showed that the increased tendency to believe in false beliefs about the COVID-19 pandemic may be associated with an increase in the severity of anxiety (b = 0.04; p = 0.021) and depression (b = 0.06; p < 0.001) symptoms. It can be hypothesized that the tendency to believe in false information regarding the COVID-19 pandemic is positively associated with the tendency to general belief in conspiracy theories. False beliefs about the COVID-19 pandemic may, at least to some extent, influence the development of anxiety and depression symptoms. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-9209766 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2022 |
publisher | Frontiers Media S.A. |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-92097662022-06-22 Conspiratorial Beliefs About COVID-19 Pandemic - Can They Pose a Mental Health Risk? The Relationship Between Conspiracy Thinking and the Symptoms of Anxiety and Depression Among Adult Poles Dȩbski, Paweł Boroń, Adrianna Kapuśniak, Natalia Dȩbska-Janus, Małgorzata Piegza, Magdalena Gorczyca, Piotr Front Psychiatry Psychiatry The aim of the study was to describe the relationship between the tendency to believe in false information about the COVID-19 pandemic, tendency to believe in conspiracy theories and the severity of anxiety and depression symptoms among the surveyed Poles. The study was conducted via the Internet in a group of 700 people aged 24.8 ± 6.3 years (mean ± SD). 585 females and 110 males were involved. Scales such as Generic Conspiracist Beliefs Scale (GCBS), Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS) and the original questionnaire COVID-19 Conspiratorial Beliefs Scale (COVID-19 CBS) designed to measure the tendency to believe in false information about COVID-19 pandemic were used. A positive correlation was observed between the tendency to believe in false information about the COVID-19 pandemic (COVID-19 CBS) and the tendency to believe in general conspiracy theories (GCBS) (r = 0.768; p < 0.001). Moreover, both COVID-19 CBS and GCBS positively correlated with the severity of anxiety and depression symptoms in the study group. For COVID-19 CBS, the correlation coefficients were 0.087 (p < 0.021) and.108 (p < 0.004) for depressive and anxiety symptoms, respectively, while for GCBS the coefficients were 0.132 (p < 0.001) and 0.147 (p < 0.001). Regression analysis showed that the increased tendency to believe in false beliefs about the COVID-19 pandemic may be associated with an increase in the severity of anxiety (b = 0.04; p = 0.021) and depression (b = 0.06; p < 0.001) symptoms. It can be hypothesized that the tendency to believe in false information regarding the COVID-19 pandemic is positively associated with the tendency to general belief in conspiracy theories. False beliefs about the COVID-19 pandemic may, at least to some extent, influence the development of anxiety and depression symptoms. Frontiers Media S.A. 2022-06-07 /pmc/articles/PMC9209766/ /pubmed/35747099 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyt.2022.870128 Text en Copyright © 2022 Dȩbski, Boroń, Kapuśniak, Dȩbska-Janus, Piegza and Gorczyca. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms. |
spellingShingle | Psychiatry Dȩbski, Paweł Boroń, Adrianna Kapuśniak, Natalia Dȩbska-Janus, Małgorzata Piegza, Magdalena Gorczyca, Piotr Conspiratorial Beliefs About COVID-19 Pandemic - Can They Pose a Mental Health Risk? The Relationship Between Conspiracy Thinking and the Symptoms of Anxiety and Depression Among Adult Poles |
title | Conspiratorial Beliefs About COVID-19 Pandemic - Can They Pose a Mental Health Risk? The Relationship Between Conspiracy Thinking and the Symptoms of Anxiety and Depression Among Adult Poles |
title_full | Conspiratorial Beliefs About COVID-19 Pandemic - Can They Pose a Mental Health Risk? The Relationship Between Conspiracy Thinking and the Symptoms of Anxiety and Depression Among Adult Poles |
title_fullStr | Conspiratorial Beliefs About COVID-19 Pandemic - Can They Pose a Mental Health Risk? The Relationship Between Conspiracy Thinking and the Symptoms of Anxiety and Depression Among Adult Poles |
title_full_unstemmed | Conspiratorial Beliefs About COVID-19 Pandemic - Can They Pose a Mental Health Risk? The Relationship Between Conspiracy Thinking and the Symptoms of Anxiety and Depression Among Adult Poles |
title_short | Conspiratorial Beliefs About COVID-19 Pandemic - Can They Pose a Mental Health Risk? The Relationship Between Conspiracy Thinking and the Symptoms of Anxiety and Depression Among Adult Poles |
title_sort | conspiratorial beliefs about covid-19 pandemic - can they pose a mental health risk? the relationship between conspiracy thinking and the symptoms of anxiety and depression among adult poles |
topic | Psychiatry |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9209766/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35747099 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyt.2022.870128 |
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