Vaccine against Fake-Believe

Typically, conservatives stand in the way of economic recoveries. 

This time round, antivaxxers do.

Unless at least 85% of Americans are vaccinated against Covid-19, a rebound remains out of reach, according to Anthony Fauci.

But most Americans will never get the jab, if antivaxxers have their way.

Like those of the QAnon followers, antivaxxers' kooky beliefs rest on conspiracy theories: Covid-19 is a Democrat hoax; a Chinese weapon; a 5G side effect; a "plandemic" hatched by Bill Gates; a Commie plot to insert tracking devices in our arms; an evil inventor's dastardly scheme to control our thoughts.

Fortunately such nonsense is assailable, says Cambridge psychologist Sander van der Linden, through a method he calls prebunking.

Prebunking works like a vaccine against disinformation.

Because it's so "sticky"—able to overshadow real news—disinformation can't be debunked, van der Linden says; the only cure is to prebunk it with a strong dose of reality.

Van der Linden's fake-believe "vaccine" comes in the form of a warning. 

Through behavioral studies, the psychologist found that when believers of disinformation are informed they're being manipulated, they tend to question, if not reject, false claims, and become less willing to share them.

Much like a stop light, van der Linden's vaccine works because the warning ("You're being manipulated!") interrupts our processing of news—which is unconscious—and forces us to slow down. 

At slower speeds, we no longer accept news at face value. Our brainwaves, as it were, become disinformation-resistant.

An effective way to warn conspiracy-theory believers they're being manipulated, van der Linden adds, is to acknowledge actual conspiracies in history.

Reminding or informing them, for example, that Richard Nixon once duped the whole country suggests that they, too, can be deceived by wrong-doers.