Abstract
Beliefs, even conspiratorial ones, do not occur in a vacuum: they reflect social conditions and fulfill important identity needs, including access to social connection and playfulness; distinction, purpose, and legitimacy; and a sense of certainty, justice, and order.
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Large family, small town. That’s how Liz describes her life in the Midwest. “If you throw a rock,” she says, “you’d probably hit a cousin.” Liz is the token liberal in her family, but for a long time she still talked politics with her conservative family members around the dinner table. “Political arguments ended when dinner ended,” she recalls. All of that changed, however, after her mother, Pamela, found out about QAnon.
QAnon is a conspiracy theory based on the unfounded belief that a Satanic cabal of elite pedophiles is controlling the world and trafficking children in order to harvest the hormone adrenochrome from their blood. It originated on the anonymous message board 4chan in 2017 when a person claiming to have “Q-level security clearance” posted cryptic claims regarding a battle between good and evil within the United States government. According to this poster, “Q,” a future battle would culminate with then-president Donald Trump arresting and executing members of this cabal in a violent overthrow referred to as “the Storm.” Despite these obscure beginnings, the QAnon conspiracy theory soon spread to more mainstream social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube, where Pamela was first recommended videos about QAnon via the YouTube algorithm.
When Pamela began following QAnon, she was dealing with a series of life-altering events: grieving the sudden death of her husband, struggling with a gambling addiction, and awaiting a prison sentence. Pamela was watching videos about “ufology,” the amateur research field on extraterrestrial life, to escape from her struggles. Soon, however, her interests turned from alien abductions to Satanic pedophiles. “One week, she was talking about aliens, and the next week later she was telling me about Tom Hanks,” recounts Liz, alluding to the idea that the actor was a part of “the cabal.” Liz marvels at how quickly “the indoctrination” of her mother happened. How had QAnon found a new recruit so easily?
The question of what draws people to believe in conspiracy theories has spurred a great deal of scholarly interest. Much of the existing research is dominated by psychology, focusing on personality traits and the paranoia or alienation of individual believers. But beliefs do not occur in a vacuum: they reflect social conditions, and they can be important sources of identity. A sociological perspective can offer deeper understandings of why people believe in conspiracy theories and how they spread.
Throughout 2021, we interviewed 20 people who were concerned about their family members’ interest in the QAnon conspiracy. In doing this research, we hoped to understand how conspiratorial belief may impact relationships between believers and non-believers. As people spoke to us about their family relationships, they also revealed the identity threats that led their family members to fall down the QAnon “rabbit hole.” Although our findings are not generalizable, they suggest that the belief in conspiracies can fulfill social identity needs—needs for validation, connection, purpose, distinction, and legitimacy. We discuss these identity needs, and highlight how beliefs that may seem far-fetched, like QAnon, come to be normalized. Lastly, we explore future research possibilities for sociologists interested in the study of conspiracy theories.
What is a Conspiracy Theory?
Conspiracy theories often originate from misinformation, which is false or misleading information that isn’t supported by evidence. What distinguishes conspiracy theories from misinformation is that the former concerns beliefs about powerful people colluding for nefarious purposes. For example, those who believe that the COVID-19 virus was spread by 5G cell phone technology (which is simple misinformation) would be more likely to believe that the COVID-19 vaccine contained a microchip that would be activated by 5G and was intentionally created by Bill Gates to reduce the world population (a full-blown conspiracy theory).
While actual political conspiracies like the assassination of Julius Caesar and the Watergate scandal have been documented throughout history, and historians note that the belief in conspiracy theories has long been a part of civic and social life, the term “conspiracy theory” started to take on a negative connotation during the 20th century. Labeling a belief as a “conspiracy theory” is therefore understandably contentious, because it involves the classification of knowledge into “the credible” vs. “the paranoid.” Richard Hofstadter, in his 1964 essay “The Paranoid Style in American Politics,” called conspiracy theories a belief in concerted acts that “undermine and destroy a way of life.” For example, theories about the Bavarian Illuminati, HIV/AIDS as a state-produced weapon, and COVID-19 vaccine microchips all portray apocalyptic battles between good and evil, freedom and suppression, survival and cultural annihilation.
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In the past, conspiracy theories have tended to concern specific events, such as the moon landing, but political scientist Michael Barkun argues that the conspiracy theories of today concern “super conspiracies” involving vast, global networks that control everything and that they call attention to “enemies within” rather than interference by foreign outsiders. According to Barkun, these “super conspiracies” rely on three assumptions: that nothing happens by accident, nothing is as it seems, and everything is connected. These narratives imagine elites, motivated by a psychological drive for power, working toward a completely planned society.
What Needs Do Conspiracy Theories Fulfill?
The disembedded quality of post-modern life in the post-truth era allows conspiracy theories to function like religious communities, offering simplification in a complex and changing world. They also function as an identity resource. Sociologists have long theorized identity not as an individual possession, but a product of social processes. And the things we believe—and the reasons we believe them—play a significant role in the construction of identity. When we communicate the things we believe and the things we disavow, we signal the groups to which we would like to belong. Conspiracy theories can bolster existing ideological beliefs, help people find social connection, offer meaning and distinction, and promise certainty, justice, and order. Believers also seek political legitimacy and cultural relevance.
The Need to Affirm Existing Ideologies
People tend to believe the conspiracy theories that reaffirm their existing beliefs. QAnon is part of a long line of Satanic conspiracy theories in the United States, and those who were already predisposed toward seeing Satanic influences were likely drawn toward QAnon’s narrative of good vs. evil. As red-state resident Liz described it, the black-and-white thinking of QAnon tapped into the religious beliefs of her community: “The evangelical part of it is a big thing… we’re in the buckle of the Bible Belt, so like, everything here, if you bring religion into it, people are going to get into it.” This insight reflects the demographics from a 2022 survey by the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI), which found that White evangelical Protestants, Hispanic Protestants, and Mormons were the strongest QAnon believers out of all religious groups. The conspiracy theory is malleable enough that some adherents, known as Anons, integrate QAnon into the great apocalyptic battle predicted in the Book of Revelations.
QAnon has become so widespread in Christian circles that researchers who monitor the spread of domestic terrorism and extremism have taken note. Researcher Nicolo Miotto identified “QAnon Christian extremism,” which is characterized by government distrust, biblical literalism, apocalypticism/millennialism, antisemitism, and nationalism. QAnon shares similarities with what sociologist Tanya Telfair Sharpe calls “Identity Christianity,” which asserts that elite, evil Deep State forces (e.g., Jews, Muslims, communists, etc.) are trying to erase White Christian identity. These beliefs sanction violence and murder against people of color, Jews, and gay people.
Unsurprisingly, QAnon attracts people who are familiar with the conspiracy theory ecosystem. Observing how people who already believe in existing conspiracy theories will tend to be receptive to new ones, sociologist Ted Goertzel called conspiracy theories a “monological belief system.” For example, if a person believes in conspiracy theories about President Kennedy’s assassination, they will likely believe in conspiracy theories about the origin of HIV/AIDS. However, Goertzel’s thesis that such beliefs are highly correlated has been debated at length among researchers. Long-time surveyor of conspiracy belief, Joseph Uscinski, argues that one does not suddenly become a conspiracist overnight. Instead, a person might hold a collection of unconventional beliefs and practices—like numerology, psychics, and alternative medicine—that all harbor distrust for “the establishment.” This can lead individuals to seek a “deeper truth” than those offered through conventional knowledge, including through conspiracy theories. This ideology is known as “conspirituality,” a term coined by sociologists Charlotte Ward and David Voas in 2011. Participants in our study frequently shared examples of how their family members’ interests in alternative spiritual and healing practices could be bridges to questioning conventional authority and even to their beliefs in a shadowy, nefarious political cabal.
The Need for Social Connection and Playfulness
We began our research after the onset of the global COVID-19 pandemic, and many of the stories our participants shared emphasized the impact that the isolation and boredom of COVID-19 lockdowns had on their family members. Several participants’ family members lost their jobs before becoming interested in QAnon. Some suffered serious accidents which made it difficult for them to leave their homes. Previous research on conspiracy theories has suggested that those with weaker social networks may be more likely to be drawn to conspiracy theories, and this was suggested by our study. In the face of social isolation, conspiracy belief appears to provide a community and sense of play. QAnon in particular has a participatory aspect to it, with Anons being encouraged to “do their own research” and piece together their own theory of the truth based on the “crumbs” in Q’s posts and their own interpretations of significant events, a process referred to as “baking.” It’s through this playful search process that some Anons came to believe, for instance, that John F. Kennedy, Jr. is still alive, a theory that appeared nowhere in Q’s posts and which many high-level QAnon influencers have disavowed.
QAnon is adaptable; believers have worked to keep the theory alive in spite of its failed predictions. Indeed, QAnon has become a self-transforming machine. The aforementioned Michael Barkun would likely classify QAnon as an improvisational conspiracy theory because it collects a wide array of disparate political and spiritual ideas under one umbrella. With vague references to evil people harming children and a vague plan to stop it, people stretch QAnon to fit the zeitgeist of the moment. Perhaps this adaptability and ubiquity is why some scholars classify QAnon as a new religious movement. Many Anons in our study were reportedly religious to begin with, but QAnon offered something that a traditional church service could not: an exciting live-action role-playing game that participants could play together.
The Need for Distinction and Purpose
Barkun describes conspiracy theories as a form of stigmatized knowledge, made up of claims that have been ignored or rejected by mainstream institutions like science, academia, and government. Believers might not label themselves as conspiracy theorists; instead, they might see themselves as “skeptics” who are “just asking questions.” Sociologists Jaron Harambam and Stef Aupers explore this phenomenon in the European context, finding that believers build oppositional identities around their rejection of established academic and scientific authority. These identities give people a sense of distinction, as was evident in our interviews when participants speculated about why their family members were attracted to QAnon.
Several participants described their family members’ interest in QAnon as a way for them to feel as though they had access to secret, suppressed knowledge. McKinley’s 83-year-old mother was one example, joining a live feed she described as a “war room.” Participation in this “war room” was a point of pride for McKinley’s mother: the terminology marked her as someone who was on the inside, preparing for battle. Similar warfare and battle imagery is typical in Anon communities. On 4chan and 8kun, Anons also call for militant engagement online, calling themselves “patriots” and using “meme warfare” as common ways to advance prepositions. Likewise, former National Security Advisor to Donald Trump Michael Flynn popularized the term “digital soldiers” to refer to Anons, a title that could help to provide a sense of larger purpose for some people.
Particularly for those who feel socially marginalized, having knowledge that others do not, or claiming “superior” knowledge, allows individuals to feel more positively toward themselves. Anons criticized many of our study participants for engaging with orthodox systems like higher education or science, seeing this as evidence of naivete or manipulation. Consequently, for many Anons, being distrustful or guarded against manipulation could be a marker for being a “contrarian” or a “critical thinker,” attempting to signal uniqueness to others.
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The Need for Certainty, Justice, and Order
QAnon provided a unifying explanation for the world’s ills that was appealing to participants’ family members. Believers observed what they saw as problems—sexual abuse, political corruption, social inequality, changing social norms—and the idea that these problems were caused by a tiny circle of Satanic elites gave order to the changing social landscape. As Donna says of her mother, “It makes sense to her that the people who are in control of the banks and the money and the world would also be evil enough to be sacrificing children for adrenochrome.” QAnon gives people a chance to puzzle through cryptic messages and, like alt-right Malcolm Gladwells, identify patterns in unrelated events. This type of patternistic thinking reduces the chaos of random chance, mistakes, and serendipity.
With its emphasis on “black hats” and “white hats,” and the upcoming Storm that would wash away the evils of the world, QAnon was hopeful for those who had suffered a loss or lived through a traumatic experience. As Donna notes, “The idea of so many injustices being righted in one swoop is very attractive to” her mother. Some participants described family members telling them that the Storm would involve a “financial reset” that would wipe out debts, providing a ray of hope for those dealing with financial difficulties that seemed otherwise insurmountable. That said, without talking directly to Anons, it is difficult for us to say how much power participants’ family members had lost in their lives. American studies professor Michael Butter contends that it is not actual powerlessness that fuels such conspiracy beliefs, but the fear of becoming powerless. Regardless, the belief in conspiracy theories—with their emphasis on right vs. wrong and their provision of an enemy with clear-cut psychological motives—provides an explanation for social problems that does not require reckoning with more complicated structural realities.
The Need for Legitimacy
QAnon may have become popular for its ability to give meaning to people’s lives, recruiting a wide swath of the public, even beyond the United States. But it is unique in both the extent to which it has been legitimated by political elites and in the way its ideas have become normalized to a wider group of people who may not even be aware of QAnon. The beliefs underlying QAnon may seem far-fetched to most, yet they tie into real concerns about institutional child abuse and government corruption that have some historical precedent. Thus, despite the fantastical elements of this belief system, QAnon has been able to spread from fringe online political communities to mainstream audiences on social media platforms like YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter. It was on platforms like these where most of our participants’ family members accessed information about QAnon and found other believers. QAnon believers also attached themselves to online crusades against sex trafficking, like the “Save the Children” movement on Facebook. In this way, QAnon became normalized as just another cause for concern that came across people’s social media feeds, satisfying the need for political and cultural legitimacy for some people.
QAnon’s racial dynamics are also key to understanding the need to participate in a legitimate—albeit anti-establishment—political movement. Despite the overlap between QAnon and other movements on the far right, QAnon managed to avoid the White supremacist label, increasing its appeal to minoritized groups. In 2021, PRRI found that 58% of QAnon believers identified as White, 20% were Hispanic, 13% were Black, and 8% belonged to other races or ethnicities. Scholar Saifeldeen Zihiri and colleagues have analyzed QAnon talk on Telegram, finding that the conversations do not cleanly identify with race-based identity movements or general hate groups. The nature of QAnon’s “big tent,” with believers arriving from many different ideological points, has made it challenging to link directly to White supremacist groups. That said, PRRI’s 2021 report found that QAnon believers ranked non-English speakers in American life as the “top threat to the country,” and about a third of believers agreed that “being of Western European heritage is important to being ‘truly American.’“ Indeed, our participants noted the racial overtones of their family conversations, with many Anons supposedly unaware of the antisemitic or ethnic nationalist tropes contained in QAnon.
QAnon groups are still considered far-right allies, but the far right has been allowed to enter mainstream politics. The leading Republican party candidate for president has made numerous QAnon references and praised its followers. QAnon positions former President Trump as an anti-establishment savior, flattering his ego and boosting his political appeal. Trump’s favoritism effectively normalized QAnon’s presence in political discourse. What once may have been a belief held in confidence is now a regular feature of the political campaign trail.
QAnon’s Impact
We conducted our research in 2021, shortly after Q stopped his regular posts following Trump’s 2020 election loss. But while the stream of “Q drops” has dried up, the influence of QAnon reverberates across politics, in the United States and globally. Anti-LGBTQIA+ panics spearheaded by groups like Moms for Liberty evoke the language of child sexual abuse in the same terms as QAnon, and QAnon influences have encouraged followers to become more than digital soldiers, enjoining them to participate in politics in lawful and unlawful ways. QAnon believers have been elected to public office, from school boards to the United States Congress. Many believers were present at the insurrection on January 6, 2020, with others convicted of assaulting capitol police on that day. In the summer of 2023, the anti-trafficking film Sound of Freedom became a surprise hit, as star Jim Caviezel shared tales of adrenochrome harvesting in promotional interviews for the film on far-right and conspiracy podcasts. To a certain degree, unfounded conspiracies have been normalized within our media and political discourse.
Of course, not all conspiracy theories are the same or offer the same appeals. What makes QAnon different from conspiracy theories like 9/11 trutherism, Birtherism, or the faked moon landing is the ability for people to take ownership and live out a drama between online and offline interaction.
What Sociology Can Offer
The discipline of sociology has much to offer the study of conspiracy theories. A sociological lens can help us to understand the effects of social isolation and changing media ecosystems, and what conspiracy theories mean to the people who believe them. Beyond the issues we described above, sociologists may also help to understand conspiracy belief through a gendered lens. For example, the “new age to alt-right pipeline” appears to be a gendered phenomenon: Instagram influencers in feminized spheres such as multi-level marketing, wellness, fitness and lifestyle, alternative healing, and esoteric New Age content have been key in spreading these theories, a phenomenon that researcher Marc-Andre Argentino calls “pastel QAnon.” Future research could explore this pipeline as a gendered community-building process.
A sociological lens can help us to understand the effects of social isolation and changing media ecosystems, and what conspiracy theories mean to the people who believe them.
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Currently, the socio-relational aspect of conspiracy theories is poorly understood. In our work, we address this gap by pinpointing the tension between believers and non-believers within the family unit. This tension is where deviance is created and identity threat can be observed. Future research could examine how conspiracy theory group identity is formed and how the responses from non-believing groups in turn shape this identity. Sociologists have also done consider able work on beliefs in the context of networks. Rather than treating beliefs as discrete entities, sociologists have been exploring interrelated belief networks, mapping how they vary in their degree of organization or structure. Ongoing work on the belief networks attached to political identity would be useful to apply to conspiracy theories. Here, sociologists could identify the core and periphery of conspiracy beliefs, observing how these network structures constrain individuals’ preferences for particular conspiracy theories. Finally, on a I larger scale, sociologists could examine how conspiracy theories function as political propaganda, how they impact electoral politics, and what this means for an informed citizenry in democratic societies. Indeed, conspiracy theories have both micro and macro implications, and investigating their social significance can enhance our understandings of society on multiple levels.