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Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin
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Evolving Informational Credentials: The (Mis)Attribution of Believable Facts to Credible Sources

Alison R. Fragale

Chip Heath

Stanford University

Three studies demonstrate that individuals often rely on a "belief force equals credible source" heuristic to make source judgments, wherein they assume that statements they believe originate from credible sources. In Study 1, participants who were exposed to a statement many times (and hence believed it) were more likely to attribute it to Consumer Reports than to the National Enquirer. In Study 2, participants read a murder investigation article containing evidence against two suspects from credible and noncredible sources. When participants believed a particular suspect to be guilty, they misattributed evidence incriminating that suspect to the high-credibility source. Study 3 demonstrated that this phenomenon occurs because individuals assume their beliefs are true and that true beliefs come from credible sources; when participants were given feedback that their beliefs were incorrect, the relationship between beliefs and source inferences did not occur.

Key Words: source credibility • belief • source monitoring • rumors

Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, Vol. 30, No. 2, 225-236 (2004)
DOI: 10.1177/0146167203259933
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