Believing Covid is a hoax acts as ‘gateway’ to other conspiracy theories, study says

People convinced virus was manufactured more likely to believe false claim that US election was stolen from Donald Trump

The false belief that the Covid pandemic was a hoax can serve as a “gateway” for people to believe in other conspiracy theories, according to researchers.

People convinced the virus was manufactured for “sinister reasons” were more likely to believe in other false narratives, such as the 2020 US presidential election being stolen from Donald Trump by voter fraud.

Researchers at the University of Ohio in the US said their work suggests that conspiracy theory beliefs prompted by a single event lead to increases in conspiratorial thinking over time, in what they described as the “gateway conspiracy” hypothesis.