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Can we train ourselves out of believing in pseudoscience?

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Peer-reviewed: This work was reviewed and scrutinised by relevant independent experts.

Spanish researchers say there's a chance that we can interrupt and or stop a person from believing in pseudoscience, stereotypes and unjustified beliefs. These beliefs, called causal illusions, can lead a person to unhealthy or irresponsible opinions, so the researchers sought to train kids from 40 high schools about scientific methods and control conditions. They say, over their pilot study and a six-month follow-up, they were able to provide a reliable form of debiasing the kids against causal illusions.

Journal/conference: Royal Society Open Science

Research: Paper

Organisation/s: Universidad de Deusto, Spain

Funder: No funding information provided

Media release

From: The Royal Society

A large-scale study and six-month follow-up of an intervention to reduce causal illusions in high school students

Causal illusions are associated with pseudoscience, stereotypes, and unjustified beliefs. They consist of believing that there is a causal relationship between events that are unrelated. This research tested an educational intervention on scientific methods and control conditions to reduce them. It involved more than 40 schools, and included a pilot study (n = 287), a large-scale implementation (n = 1,668) and a six-month follow-up (n = 353). To our knowledge, this is the first research showing the efficacy and long-term effects of a debiasing intervention against causal illusions that can be used on a large scale through the educational system.

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