Abstract

This article describes a research on social representations of the Human Genome Project with a sample of university students majoring in human sciences, natural sciences and psychology field (N = 327). We investigated the semantic field, the psychological, social and psychosocial anchoring of the research object. Moreover, we investigated the relationship between social representations and attitudes toward genetic research. The social representations of the Human Genome Project are characterised by the tension between respect for nature and scientific progress. Results show that the more people pay attention to scientific research, the more they are worried about the Human Genome Project.