Book Review – Individual Differences in Resistance to Truth Decay
Image: Individual Differences in Resistance to Truth Decay by Len Lantz (CC BY-NC-ND)
Synopsis: Len's Star Rating: 8 out of 10. A book that presents valuable research findings on one of the primary drivers of Truth Decay in US society.
BY LEN LANTZ, MD / 12.27.2025; No. 136
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Star Rating – 8 out of 10
Rating guide: 1 = horrible, 5 = average and 10 = wow
Authors
Luke Matthews, Andrew Parker, Katherine Carman, Rose Kerber, and Jennifer Kavanagh
About the authors
Luke J. Matthews, PhD, has worked at RAND Corporation since 2014, where he serves as a senior behavioral and social scientist, as well as a professor of policy analysis at the RAND School of Public Policy. He earned his BS in both anthropology and biology from Indiana University of Pennsylvania, his master's and doctoral degrees in anthropology from New York University, and he completed a three-year postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard. His current research focus is on how knowledge professionals (scientists, doctors, and journalists) produce truth, misinformation, or something in between.
Andrew M. Parker, PhD, has been with the RAND Corporation since 2009, where he currently serves as a senior behavioral scientist and professor of policy analysis at the RAND School of Public Policy. He also served as the founding director of RAND’s Center for Decision Making under Uncertainty. He earned his BAs in psychology and statistics from the University of Michigan, his master's degree in statistics from Carnegie Mellon University, and his PhD in behavioral decision theory from Carnegie Mellon University. While at RAND, he has served as both a principal investigator and project co-lead for research projects at US federal agencies.
Katherine Grace Carman, PhD, is a senior financial economist at the US Securities and Exchange Commission, and she served at RAND Corporation (2012-2023) as a senior economist and director of RAND’s Center for Financial and Economic Decision Making. She earned her BA in economics from the University of Michigan and her PhD in economics from Stanford. She also completed a two-year fellowship as a Robert Wood Johnson Health Policy Scholar at Harvard. She was an assistant professor at Tilburg University (2005-2012) and also a professor at the Pardee RAND Graduate School.
Rose Kerber, MPP, has been a research programmer at RAND Corporation since 2009. She earned her BA in economics from Eckerd College and her master’s degree in public policy from Duke University.
Jennifer Kavanagh, PhD, is a political scientist and published researcher in US national security and defense policy. She currently serves as senior fellow and director of military analysis at Defense Priorities. Her previous roles include working as a senior fellow in the American Statecraft Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and as a senior policy analyst (2011-2022) at the RAND Corporation. Dr. Kavanagh earned her BA in government at Harvard and her PhD in political science and public policy from the University of Michigan. She is a term member of the Council on Foreign Relations and an adjunct professor in the Security Studies Program at Georgetown University. She is a co-author of the book Truth Decay.
General description
Individual Differences in Resistance to Truth Decay is an original research report (as part of the RAND research report series) available in printed form and as a free download, which seeks to increase understanding and describe one of Truth Decay’s four proposed drivers (characteristics of human cognitive processing, such as cognitive biases). Truth Decay is a societal phenomenon characterized by increasing political polarization and declining civil discourse in the US, primarily due to disagreements over facts. The authors of this study investigated cognitive biases, reasoning processes, and demographics in relation to Truth Decay.
Unique and most important aspects
Individual Differences in Resistance to Truth Decay is a self-published research study by the RAND Corporation and a major follow-up to their landmark text, Truth Decay (see book review). While the results were not especially surprising, they were important nonetheless. The authors did an excellent job conducting a survey of 1,333 people on questions related to Truth Decay and analyzing the responses.
I was surprised that this article was not published in an academic journal, but perhaps it was due to the importance that RAND places on disseminating information to the public or the length of the text, which is around five times longer than a typical social science article from an academic journal. Note to readers: if you don’t like reading research articles, you are unlikely to enjoy this report.
From a personal standpoint, I think some of the survey questions used to generate this report could have been more specific. For example, one of the assessment questions was “In general, how safe do you think genetically modified foods are for human consumption?” Are the authors inquiring whether the macronutrients and micronutrients of genetically modified food are generally safe, or whether consuming GMO “Roundup Ready®” corn that has been treated with glyphosate is safe?
Essential features of this text include explanations on:
The six scales of resistance/susceptibility to Truth Decay
Endorsement of scientific consensus
Endorsement of verifiable facts
Rejection of false conspiracy theories
Ability to distinguish fact from opinion
Willingness to accept expert recommendations
Philosophical positivism versus skepticism
Reasoning processes that predicted greater resistance to Truth Decay
Higher numeracy (skill with numbers)
Stronger scientific reasoning (science literacy)
Lower magical thinking (superstitious beliefs)
Mixed results regarding greater resistance or susceptibility to Truth Decay related to cognitive biases
Availability bias (events that are easier to recall are judged as more likely to occur)
Unjustified confidence (aka, overconfidence)
Ingroup bias (feeling more warmly toward your own cultural group)
Demographics that predicted greater resistance to Truth Decay
Higher income
White ethnicity
Having voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016
How myside bias (testing bias toward previous opinions/attitudes) and confirmation bias (seeking evidence that confirms previous opinions while ignoring/rejecting evidence that contradicts previous opinions) are also relevant to understanding Truth Decay
Best quotes
“If these results—that there is a substantial disconnect between generally accepted truth and certain sociodemographic and political groups—hold, a distrust of societal experts will make it difficult to identify any traditionally trusted category of messenger (for example, journalists, religious leaders) who would be credible to reestablish truth claims with all parts of the American public.”
“Specifically, the research presented here tests the hypothesis that more logical reasoning and less cognitive bias are associated with greater resistance to Truth Decay.”
“Thus, a decline in trust of religious leaders may be correlated with other similar components of Truth Decay.”
“Modern democracies are sustained by institutions that are themselves sustained by classes of experts trained in particular roles. Autocracies, in contrast, are frequently centered on a cult of personality that surrounds a particular person (the autocrat).”
“Truth Decay, at its root, is a set of phenomena regarding how people process and make judgments about information.”
“Although both confirmation bias and myside bias might explain some aspects of the Truth Decay phenomenon, they are not synonymous with it because Truth Decay is a phenomenon to be explained (the explanandum), not an explanation itself.”
“This is the first study of which we are aware to propose a comprehensive assessment of resistance/susceptibility to Truth Decay.”
“This [study] suggests that potentially powerful tools to combat Truth Decay might reside within the educational system (conceived broadly) rather than in trying to counter availability bias and other biases related to ‘fast thinking’ cognitive heuristics (Kahneman, 2011).”
“Our models also support the assertion that the perceptions of key issues, worldviews, and even ways of processing information in the United States could also be split according to partisanship and religiosity.”
Who would enjoy this book?
Readers interested in exploring new research findings on Truth Decay will likely enjoy Individual Differences in Resistance to Truth Decay.
Who would not enjoy this book?
Readers who struggle with research articles or distrust research from the RAND Corporation are unlikely to enjoy Individual Differences in Resistance to Truth Decay.
Conclusion
Individual Differences in Resistance to Truth Decay presents valuable research findings on one of the primary drivers of Truth Decay in US society.
