Don't tell Arizona: One in five say space aliens living in our neighborhoods

In April, , a survey of 22,000 people in 22 different countries reported that one in five respondents said they agreed either “strongly or somewhat” that extraterrestrials are already living in their communities, disguised as human beings. That works out to a lot of people presumably with humanoid aliens as neighbours – especially in China and India, where the number of people agreeing with that statement came in at an astonishing 42 and 43 per cent respectively. Canadians were more skeptical at 16 per cent: Which was less than the Americans at 24 per cent, but bigger believers than western European countries such as Denmark, at 8 per cent.

“Were the respondents drunk?” said Susan Clancy, a psychology professor at Harvard University and the author of Abducted: How People Come to Believe They Were Kidnapped By Aliens, echoing other sociologists’ doubts.

But surveys over the past few decades have shown an enduring belief in E.T. encounters. A 2005 Gallup poll, for instance, found that 24 per cent of Americans and 21 per cent of Canadians believe that “extraterrestrial beings have visited the Earth at some time in the past.” Believers also include Apollo 14 astronaut Edgar Mitchell, who said in 2007 that the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration had covered up UFO visits; Miyki Hatoyama, the first lady of Japan, who insists a UFO carried her to Venus; and a portion of Denver’s citizenry who is pushing for an August vote that would require the city to form a commission to collect evidence that E.T. has already landed.

“There are a lot of people, more than you think, who do believe in impossible things, like aliens and abduction ..., and that [aliens] are here on Earth walking among us,” says Dr. Clancy, whose research included people from every social strata. “We’re exposed to a lot of cultural scripts [movies] that tell us it’s possible ... and most of us want to believe it’s possible.”

You know, when it comes to surveys on all sorts of matters from politics to science to ethics, religion, pseudoscience and the paranormal there seems to be consistently 20% - 40% who hold what can be considered extreme or extraordinary beliefs. Is it possible that 20% represents a sort of lower limit on the number of people who hold beliefs that differ significantly from group norms?