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Historical myths are appealing primarily because they provide people with views of life and their role in it as significant and enduring. These worldviews help people manage death anxiety by enabling them to view themselves as part of something great that stretches far into the past and endures indefinitely into the future. We review empirical evidence supporting this analysis.
Finding one’s niche in any scientific domain is often challenging, but there are certain tips and steps that can foster a productive research program. In this chapter, we use terror management theory (TMT) as an exemplar of what designing a successful line of research entails. To this end, we present an overview of the development and execution of our research program, including testing of original hypotheses, direct and conceptual replications, identification of moderating and mediating variables, and how efforts to understand failures to replicate mortality salience effects led to important conceptual refinements of the theory. Our hope is that recounting the history of terror management theory and research will be useful for younger scholars in their own research pursuits in the social and behavioral sciences.