How Will We React to the Discovery of Extraterrestrial Life

摘要: How will humanity react to the discovery of extraterrestrial life? Speculation on this topic abounds, but empirical research is practically non-existent. We report results three studies assessing psychological reactions life using Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC) text analysis software. examined language use in media coverage past announcements nature, with a focus microbial (Pilot Study). A large online sample (N = 501) was asked write about their own humanity’s reaction hypothetical announcement such (Study 1), an independent, 256) read respond newspaper story claim that fossilized had been found meteorite Martian origin 2). Across these studies, we were significantly more positive than negative, reward vs. risk oriented. mini-meta-analysis revealed overall effect sizes (positive negative affect language: g .98; .81). also people’s forecasts showed greater positivity bias responses reading actual creation man-made synthetic Taken together, work suggests our future confirmed are likely be fairly positive.