Repetition makes a fact seem more true, regardless of whether it is or not. Understanding this effect can help you avoid falling for propaganda, says psychologist Tom Stafford.
“Repeat a lie often enough and it becomes the truth”, is a law of propaganda often attributed to the Nazi Joseph Goebbels. Among psychologists something like this known as the "illusion of truth" effect. Here's how a typical experiment on the effect works: participants rate how true trivia items are, things like "A prune is a dried plum". Sometimes these items are true (like that one), but sometimes participants see a parallel version which isn't true (something like "A date is a dried plum").
After a break – of minutes or even weeks – the participants do the procedure again, but this time some of the items they rate are new, and some they saw before in the first phase. The key finding is that people tend to rate items they've seen before as more likely to be true, regardless of whether they are true or not, and seemingly for the sole reason that they are more familiar.
Repetition makes a fact seem more true, regardless of whether it is or not. Understanding the "illusion of truth" effect can help you avoid falling victim to this trick.
www.bbc.com
I've not seen a better explanation for how so many lies spewed by trump have become adopted by The Following as the truth. Most of us intuitively know it to be so. What else accounts for the persistent belief in the Big Lie, and so many others?
But he can't do it alone. What doesn't get enough attention is the crucial role conservative media plays in reinforcing the lies trump tells. If Faux fact checked trump on a regular basis the country would be a far different place. But then Faux's on air personalities lie inveterately as well. It's an essential part of their business model. Not correcting a lie being almost as bad as starting one.
There's another name for the "illusion of truth" trumples so ardently believe in. Coined by trump's former chief propagandist, Kellyanne. It's called "alternative facts."
Kellyanne Conway, adviser to President Trump, joined “Meet the Press”on January 22, 2017. Chuck Todd pressed her about Trump’s decision to have Press Secretary Sean Spicer lie about inauguration crowd sizes. Conway said Spicer provided the White House Press Corps with “alternative facts.” Chuck...
www.nbcnews.com
What began as a tortured excuse for Sean Spicer's inaugural crowd size lie has blossomed in to the belief in what is tantamount to a parallel universe. A safe place for The Following to retreat to when reality becomes unbearably inconvenient.
