Researchers from Leiden University analysed almost 30 years of communication on astrobiology. News articles proved most speculative, especially via quotes from scientists. Especially exoplanet research is often accompanied by high expectations about extraterrestrial life, they write in PLOS One.
Astrobiology poses fundamental questions about life in the universe: how did it emerge? Is there life beyond Earh? In the recently published study, researchers investigated how the field was portrayed in the public sphere from 1996 to 2024 by shining light on what speculations and promises about the search for life elsewhere are circulating in the media.
The researchers examined three kinds of sources of information about science: academic papers, press releases and news articles. Albergaria and his colleagues found that the most frequent speculations were about conditions or ingredients for life beyond Earth, followed by speculations on the existence of life. They also found speculations about the outcomes of the search to be uncommon, while speculative content on potential evidence pointing to life detection is rare.
Finding extraterrestrial life
The study found that expectations that technology will help find life beyond Earth are relatively high, appearing roughly in 1/3 of news articles, 1/5 of press releases and 1/10 of papers. The promise that astrobiology is making progress in the search for life was also quite common, with about 1/5 of press releases and news articles exhibiting this kind of content.
In contrast, they found that promises of life detection are very rare. ‘Among news articles, we examined those covering studies published in peer reviewed journals. In general, scientists don’t seem comfortable setting expectations on the prospects of life detection when talking about their own research,’ says Albergaria, the first author of the study.
Grabbing media attention
News articles presented more speculations and promises than press releases and papers but press releases had slightly more speculative content when communicating about the significance of research results. ‘This may reflect pressures for institutional communications to emphasize the impact of a study to grab media attention,’ explains Albergaria.
Papers showed much less speculations and promises than press releases and news stories, yet peer reviewed articles also exhibited some speculative content, especially about conditions and ingredients for life beyond Earth.
The role of researchers in communication
The team also mapped how frequently speculations and promises appeared associated with authors of studies, with outside experts or without attribution to researchers. Press releases presented speculations most frequently in quotes of authors of studies, while in news articles speculative content appears more balanced between quoted researchers and without attribution to scientists. This underlines the role researchers play in the communication of the field.
The study also found that expectations about the search for life are more associated with exoplanet research than solar system exploration, and much higher than about the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI).
Speculation is inevitable
Albergaria ponders that speculations are not necessarily bad science communication. ‘Speculative imagination helps to develop concepts and hypotheses that guide the search. There are many unknowns about life in the universe and that’s why speculations in the communication of astrobiology seem almost inevitable. So, it’s still difficult to clearly distinguish unwarranted speculative content and legitimate contextualization,’ he explains. ‘We need more research on that.’
In total, 630 articles were subject to a quantitative content analysis. Most were published in English, but the analysis also includes news stories published in Portuguese and Spanish. Articles came from six reference newspapers: The New York Times (USA), The Guardian (UK), Folha and Estadão (Brazil), Público (Portugal) and El País (Spain).
Scientific publication
Communicating astrobiology and the search for life elsewhere: Speculations and promises of a developing scientific field in newspapers, press releases and papers; Danilo Albergaria, Pedro Russo, Ionica Smeets, Thilina Heenatigala, and Dallyce Vetter.
Read the publication here!
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The Netherlands Research School for Astronomy (NOVA) is the alliance of the astronomical institutes of the universities of Amsterdam, Groningen, Leiden, and Nijmegen. The mission of Top Research School NOVA is to carry out frontline astronomical research in the Netherlands, to train young astronomers at the highest international level, and to share its new discoveries with society. The NOVA laboratories are specialised in building state-of-the-art optical/infrared and submillimeter instrumentation for the largest telescopes on earth.
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