Why People "Fly from Facts" - Scientific American

“There was a scientific study that showed vaccines cause autism.”

“Actually, the researcher in that study lost his medical license, and overwhelming research since then has shown no linkbetween vaccines and autism.”

“Well, regardless, it’s still my personal right as a parent to make decisions for my child.”

Does that exchange sound familiar: a debate that starts with testable factual statements, but then, when the truth becomes inconvenient, the person takes a flight from facts....

More @ Why People "Fly from Facts" - Scientific American
The Psychological Advantage of Unfalsifiability: The Appeal of Untestable Religious and Political Ideologies.

We propose that people may gain certain "offensive" and "defensive" advantages for their cherished belief systems (e.g., religious and political views) by including aspects of unfalsifiability in those belief systems, such that some aspects of the beliefs cannot be tested empirically and conclusively refuted. This may seem peculiar, irrational, or at least undesirable to many people because it is assumed that the primary purpose of a belief is to know objective truth. However, past research suggests that accuracy is only one psychological motivation among many, and falsifiability or testability may be less important when the purpose of a belief serves other psychological motives (e.g., to maintain one's worldviews, serve an identity). In Experiments 1 and 2 we demonstrate the "offensive" function of unfalsifiability: that it allows religious adherents to hold their beliefs with more conviction and political partisans to polarize and criticize their opponents more extremely. Next we demonstrate unfalsifiability's "defensive" function: When facts threaten their worldviews, religious participants frame specific reasons for their beliefs in more unfalsifiable terms (Experiment 3) and political partisans construe political issues as more unfalsifiable ("moral opinion") instead of falsifiable ("a matter of facts"; Experiment 4). We conclude by discussing how in a world where beliefs and ideas are becoming more easily testable by data, unfalsifiability might be an attractive aspect to include in one's belief systems, and how unfalsifiability may contribute to polarization, intractability, and the marginalization of science in public discourse. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2014 APA, all rights reserved). PMID: 25402678  [PubMed - as supplied by publisher] Friesen JP, Campbell TH, Kay AC.

J Pers Soc Psychol. 2014 Nov 17. [Epub ahead of print]