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2024-08-21

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cc-by (c) Martínez, N. et al., 2024
Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/2445/219184

A large-scale study and six-month follow-up of an intervention to reduce causal illusions in high school students

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Abstract

Causal illusions consist of believing that there is a causal relationship between events that are actually unrelated. This bias is associated with pseudoscience, stereotypes and other unjustified beliefs. Thus, it seems important to develop educational interventions to reduce them. To our knowledge, the only debiasing intervention designed to be used at schools was developed by Barberia et al. (Barberia et al. 2013 PLoS One 8, e71303 (doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0071303)), focusing on base rates, control conditions and confounding variables. Their assessment used an active causal illusion task where participants could manipulate the candidate cause. The intervention reduced causal illusions in adolescents but was only tested in a small experimental project. The present research evaluated it in a large-scale project through a collaboration with the Spanish Foundation for Science and Technology (FECYT), and was conducted in schools to make it ecologically valid. It included a pilot study (n = 287), a large-scale implementation (n = 1668; 40 schools) and a six-month follow-up (n = 353). Results showed medium-tolarge and long-lasting effects on the reduction of causal illusions. To our knowledge, this is the first research showing the efficacy and long-term effects of a debiasing intervention against causal illusions that can be used on a large scale through the educational system.

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https://doi.org/10.1098/rsos.240846

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Pseudociència, Intervenció educativa, Estereotip (Psicologia), Alumnes, Educació secundària

Subject (English)

Pseudoscience, Educational intervention, Stereotype (Psychology), School children, Secondary education

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Articles publicats en revistes (Cognició, Desenvolupament i Psicologia de l'Educació)

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MARTÍNEZ, Naroa, et al. A large-scale study and six-month follow-up of an intervention to reduce causal illusions in high school students. Royal Society Open Science. 2024. Vol. 11, num. 8, pags. 240846. ISSN 2054-5703. [consulted: 15 of October of 2026]. Available at: https://hdl.handle.net/2445/219184

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