Bullshit Receptivity and Susceptibility to Framing across Domains and Cultures

Nikolay Rachev is assistant professor in cognitive psychology at Sofia University “St. Kliment Ohridski”. His research interests have been inspired by the heuristics and biases approach to judgment and decision making pioneered by Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman. His current work focuses on individual differences and cultural variations in rational thought.

Project description
The framing effect, whereby different presentations of the same problem lead to predictably different choices, has been identified as a potentially powerful tool to nudge people towards better choices. But are all people equally susceptible to framing? This project will test whether the tendency to passively accept the presented frame, across several topics relevant to everyday life, is related to the uncritical reception of novel information. The latter will be measured by the Pseudoprofound Bullshit Receptivity Scale (Pennycook et al., 2015)—a set of randomly generated statements having a seemingly deep meaning. Further exploring cross-cultural variations in framing, bullshit receptivity, and their relationship can ultimately help policymakers direct nudges to individuals and groups that would benefit the most from them.