National psychology
Encyclopedia
National Psychology refers to the (real or alleged) distinctive psychological make-up of particular nations, ethnic groups or people, and to the comparative study of those characteristics in social psychology
Social psychology
Social psychology is the scientific study of how people's thoughts, feelings, and behaviors are influenced by the actual, imagined, or implied presence of others. By this definition, scientific refers to the empirical method of investigation. The terms thoughts, feelings, and behaviors include all...

, sociology
Sociology
Sociology is the study of society. It is a social science—a term with which it is sometimes synonymous—which uses various methods of empirical investigation and critical analysis to develop a body of knowledge about human social activity...

, political science
Political science
Political Science is a social science discipline concerned with the study of the state, government and politics. Aristotle defined it as the study of the state. It deals extensively with the theory and practice of politics, and the analysis of political systems and political behavior...

 and anthropology
Anthropology
Anthropology is the study of humanity. It has origins in the humanities, the natural sciences, and the social sciences. The term "anthropology" is from the Greek anthrōpos , "man", understood to mean mankind or humanity, and -logia , "discourse" or "study", and was first used in 1501 by German...

.

The assumption of national psychology is that different ethnic groups, or the people living in a national territory, are characterized by a distinctive "mix" of human attitudes
Attitude (psychology)
An attitude is a hypothetical construct that represents an individual's degree of like or dislike for something. Attitudes are generally positive or negative views of a person, place, thing, or event— this is often referred to as the attitude object...

, values, emotions, motivation
Motivation
Motivation is the driving force by which humans achieve their goals. Motivation is said to be intrinsic or extrinsic. The term is generally used for humans but it can also be used to describe the causes for animal behavior as well. This article refers to human motivation...

 and abilities which is culturally reinforced by the family
Family
In human context, a family is a group of people affiliated by consanguinity, affinity, or co-residence. In most societies it is the principal institution for the socialization of children...

, schooling, the state
State (polity)
A state is an organized political community, living under a government. States may be sovereign and may enjoy a monopoly on the legal initiation of force and are not dependent on, or subject to any other power or state. Many states are federated states which participate in a federal union...

 and the media
Media (communication)
In communications, media are the storage and transmission channels or tools used to store and deliver information or data...

.

According to the pioneer psychologist Wilhelm Wundt
Wilhelm Wundt
Wilhelm Maximilian Wundt was a German physician, psychologist, physiologist, philosopher, and professor, known today as one of the founding figures of modern psychology. He is widely regarded as the "father of experimental psychology"...

, the attempt to theorize scientifically about national psychology dates from the mid-19th century http://psychclassics.yorku.ca/Wundt/Folk/intro.htm.

Use of national psychology

National psychology plays a role in politics via the ideology
Ideology
An ideology is a set of ideas that constitutes one's goals, expectations, and actions. An ideology can be thought of as a comprehensive vision, as a way of looking at things , as in common sense and several philosophical tendencies , or a set of ideas proposed by the dominant class of a society to...

 of nationalism
Nationalism
Nationalism is a political ideology that involves a strong identification of a group of individuals with a political entity defined in national terms, i.e. a nation. In the 'modernist' image of the nation, it is nationalism that creates national identity. There are various definitions for what...

. Politicians will appeal e.g. to "the French people", "the American people", the "Russian people", the idea being that members of a nation have a common national identity
National identity
National identity is the person's identity and sense of belonging to one state or to one nation, a feeling one shares with a group of people, regardless of one's citizenship status....

, are part of a national community, and share common interests (the "national interest"). Politicians must try to unify and integrate people to work together for common goals, and appealing to their common national characteristics is often part of that.

Closely related is the idea of the national character which refers to the values, norms and customs which people of a nation typically hold, their typical emotional responses, and what they regard as virtue
Virtue
Virtue is moral excellence. A virtue is a positive trait or quality subjectively deemed to be morally excellent and thus is valued as a foundation of principle and good moral being....

 and vice
Vice
Vice is a practice or a behavior or habit considered immoral, depraved, or degrading in the associated society. In more minor usage, vice can refer to a fault, a defect, an infirmity, or merely a bad habit. Synonyms for vice include fault, depravity, sin, iniquity, wickedness, and corruption...

 - all factors which determine how they will habitually respond to situations.

It is argued, that it is possible to identify (observe and measure) some personal characteristics which are a "modal average" among people within a nation. It does not mean that all citizens must necessarily share (all of the) national characteristics, but that the number of people embodying a "national culture" is sufficiently large to be "typical" in the country, and have a real influence in social life. Some nationally common features could be rather unique to a country, but other nationally common features could be shared to some extent by other countries.

Nationalism aims to unite people as members of a nation, and for the purpose the belief
Belief
Belief is the psychological state in which an individual holds a proposition or premise to be true.-Belief, knowledge and epistemology:The terms belief and knowledge are used differently in philosophy....

 that they really have common national characteristics is obviously useful, even those common characteristics cannot be proved beyond a shared language and a similar physical appearance. Friendly rivalry between national sports teams is often used to symbolize national identity or to express patriotism
Patriotism
Patriotism is a devotion to one's country, excluding differences caused by the dependencies of the term's meaning upon context, geography and philosophy...

.
  • In post-1871 Germany, but especially during the Third Reich, a number of German professors of linguistics and literature attempted to influence the area of English Studies
    English studies
    English studies is an academic discipline that includes the study of literatures written in the English language , English linguistics English studies is an academic discipline that includes the study of literatures written in the English language (including literatures from the U.K., U.S.,...

     with a politically-motivated cultural science which Ernst Leisi has aptly termed "Nationalpsychologische Methode." The paradigm, which claimed to present a new view of contemporary and past English on the basis of analogies drawn between specific linguistic traits and practices and constituents of the English (and German) national character amounted to little more than a repetition of preconceived notions of otherness.


National psychology has sometimes been used to explain why economic development occurred in a different way in different countries, or why a particular turn of political events happened as it did.

Reference is sometimes made to the "national psyche
Psyche (psychology)
The word psyche has a long history of use in psychology and philosophy, dating back to ancient times, and has been one of the fundamental concepts for understanding human nature from a scientific point of view. The English word soul is sometimes used synonymously, especially in older...

" or the "soul
Soul
A soul in certain spiritual, philosophical, and psychological traditions is the incorporeal essence of a person or living thing or object. Many philosophical and spiritual systems teach that humans have souls, and others teach that all living things and even inanimate objects have souls. The...

" of a nation, to explain why some public events can trigger a commotion or uproar in a country, or why a particular nation gets particularly enthusiastic or obsessed with a sport
Sport
A Sport is all forms of physical activity which, through casual or organised participation, aim to use, maintain or improve physical fitness and provide entertainment to participants. Sport may be competitive, where a winner or winners can be identified by objective means, and may require a degree...

 or cultural practice.

The idea is that a nation shares a specific cultural mentality, morality
Morality
Morality is the differentiation among intentions, decisions, and actions between those that are good and bad . A moral code is a system of morality and a moral is any one practice or teaching within a moral code...

 or mindset
Mindset
In decision theory and general systems theory, a mindset is a set of assumptions, methods or notations held by one or more people or groups of people which is so established that it creates a powerful incentive within these people or groups to continue to adopt or accept prior behaviors, choices,...

, embedded in its language
Language
Language may refer either to the specifically human capacity for acquiring and using complex systems of communication, or to a specific instance of such a system of complex communication...

 and institutions, which causes it to react much more strongly, or much less strongly, to particular situations than people of other nations would, and that people from different nations have different problem-solving strategies.

Criticism of the concept

However, the validity of the idea of a "national psychology" has been strongly criticized, both for political/moral and scientific reasons.
  • Politically and morally, because it is conducive to racist generalisations about people, i.e. arbitrary discrimination
    Discrimination
    Discrimination is the prejudicial treatment of an individual based on their membership in a certain group or category. It involves the actual behaviors towards groups such as excluding or restricting members of one group from opportunities that are available to another group. The term began to be...

     between people in accordance with some prejudice
    Prejudice
    Prejudice is making a judgment or assumption about someone or something before having enough knowledge to be able to do so with guaranteed accuracy, or "judging a book by its cover"...

     or personal interest, which obstructs the acceptance of people as they are. This can lead to dour stereotypes and cliches. For example: "Africans are lazy", "the Dutch are stingy", "Americans are greedy", "the French are romantic" "the Pakistanis are terrorists" etc. National chauvinism
    Chauvinism
    Chauvinism, in its original and primary meaning, is an exaggerated, bellicose patriotism and a belief in national superiority and glory. It is an eponym of a possibly fictional French soldier Nicolas Chauvin who was credited with many superhuman feats in the Napoleonic wars.By extension it has come...

     may lead directly to ascriptive discrimination
    Discrimination
    Discrimination is the prejudicial treatment of an individual based on their membership in a certain group or category. It involves the actual behaviors towards groups such as excluding or restricting members of one group from opportunities that are available to another group. The term began to be...

     against foreigners, meaning that one's own people are regarded as naturally superior, and foreigners inferior, rather than just different in some respects. At a more subtle level, it may be necessary to know and understand some ethnic characteristics to be able to get along in a foreign place, but people may not agree about what kind of knowledge is relevant here. The reason is that it is not simply a "scientific issue" or a "practical matter", but also a matter of moral expectations - the norms of foreigners and locals may clash, without it being clear that either is better than the other.

  • Scientifically, because it is in reality very difficult to describe and generalise about ethnic differences in a valid and objective
    Objectivity (science)
    Objectivity in science is a value that informs how science is practiced and how scientific truths are created. It is the idea that scientists, in attempting to uncover truths about the natural world, must aspire to eliminate personal biases, a priori commitments, emotional involvement, etc...

     way. What applies to a nationality may not apply at all to an individual who is part of that nation. Insofar as the generalizations and distinctions drawn are valid, they may be too general, or require too many qualifications, to be useful. There is an intrinsic difficulty involved in verifying national-psychological characteristics scientifically in any positivistic sense, because often interpretive constructs are being assumed and used which may themselves not be based on any solid evidence, just conjecture. Thus, it is always possible that researchers implicitly "assume what they are trying to prove" - they interpret fragmentary observational evidence about a large, complex community with categories that would support a particular theory.


Part of the problem is also that researchers usually interpret another culture from the point of view of the culture they are used to (regarded as "normal"). Even if many people in a country share a common psychological or biological characteristic, other people in that country may not share that characteristic at all. The important ways in which people differ may outweigh the common characteristics which they can all be proved to share.

Psychologists have found in research that when subjects are asked to identify the ethnicity or nationality of individuals by observing a line-up of different people, they cannot accurately recognize what their ethnicity or nationality is. Marketing
Marketing
Marketing is the process used to determine what products or services may be of interest to customers, and the strategy to use in sales, communications and business development. It generates the strategy that underlies sales techniques, business communication, and business developments...

 and Media
Mass media
Mass media refers collectively to all media technologies which are intended to reach a large audience via mass communication. Broadcast media transmit their information electronically and comprise of television, film and radio, movies, CDs, DVDs and some other gadgets like cameras or video consoles...

 experts have found that at most people can identify a representative stereotype
Stereotype
A stereotype is a popular belief about specific social groups or types of individuals. The concepts of "stereotype" and "prejudice" are often confused with many other different meanings...

, archetype
Archetype
An archetype is a universally understood symbol or term or pattern of behavior, a prototype upon which others are copied, patterned, or emulated...

 or caricature
Caricature
A caricature is a portrait that exaggerates or distorts the essence of a person or thing to create an easily identifiable visual likeness. In literature, a caricature is a description of a person using exaggeration of some characteristics and oversimplification of others.Caricatures can be...

 which symbolises a particular ethnic group, or characteristic ways of relating which a nation has.

Some additional complications are, that:
  • the mentality of a nation may change over time, through shared experiences, and therefore that the characteristics which are thought to be "typical" of a nation may change over time. In modern society, often the young generation no longer identifies with the ways of the old generation, including their ideas of national identity and norms.

  • large-scale international migration
    International migration
    International migration occurs when peoples cross state boundaries and stay in the host state for some minimum length of time. Migration occurs for many reasons. Many people leave their home countries in order to look for economic opportunities in another country. Others migrate to be with family...

     of peoples from different nations means that immigrants take on part of the habits and culture of the country to which they move, while also retaining part of their original culture. In this way, different national cultures are merged or mixed, and a new culture may be formed which has no clear "national" identification. This, together with the growth of international tourism
    Tourism
    Tourism is travel for recreational, leisure or business purposes. The World Tourism Organization defines tourists as people "traveling to and staying in places outside their usual environment for not more than one consecutive year for leisure, business and other purposes".Tourism has become a...

    , also means that people in one country increasingly adopt customs and habits from other countries, so that a nationally distinctive culture declines.

  • When there are fights about identity, when people feel insecure about their identity, or when they try to get their identity accepted by others, a lot of people may claim they have important characteristics in common, or that they differ from others, even although there is in truth little objective evidence for it. A fairly large "national movement" may appear of people sharing a national belief, even although in reality they do not have all that much in common. That is, people's desire to feel that they have something in common, makes them act "as though" it already exists, even though this is not really true.


Because of all these difficulties in defining national psychology, often the most insightful portrayals of it are not really "scientific", but are found rather in the metaphors of fiction, for example in novels and films. These can gives insight into the "typical" emotional and intellectual world of a people, without pretending to apply to all its members.

Globalization and postmodernity

Some writers argue that in the era of globalisation, national or ethnic differences can less and less explain why people behave as they do. Increasingly, it seems that many people do not identify with being part of a nation
Nation
A nation may refer to a community of people who share a common language, culture, ethnicity, descent, and/or history. In this definition, a nation has no physical borders. However, it can also refer to people who share a common territory and government irrespective of their ethnic make-up...

, and just want to be recognized as a human being with human rights
Human rights
Human rights are "commonly understood as inalienable fundamental rights to which a person is inherently entitled simply because she or he is a human being." Human rights are thus conceived as universal and egalitarian . These rights may exist as natural rights or as legal rights, in both national...

. They might cherish the place where they were born, without however being particularly patriotic. Other writers note that appeals to a national identity can be revived and used as a xenophobic response to perceptions that a country or region is being "taken over" by foreign corporations, or "overrun" by foreign immigrants.

Especially in Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

 but also in many other parts of the world, adherence to a religion
Religion
Religion is a collection of cultural systems, belief systems, and worldviews that establishes symbols that relate humanity to spirituality and, sometimes, to moral values. Many religions have narratives, symbols, traditions and sacred histories that are intended to give meaning to life or to...

 has strongly declined, and therefore the shared view of morality
Morality
Morality is the differentiation among intentions, decisions, and actions between those that are good and bad . A moral code is a system of morality and a moral is any one practice or teaching within a moral code...

 and human nature
Human nature
Human nature refers to the distinguishing characteristics, including ways of thinking, feeling and acting, that humans tend to have naturally....

 which religious authorities previously provided is no longer accepted. Religion has had a very strong influence on the shaping of national identity, and as this influence has declined, it can no longer define a national psychology as it used to. However, in other parts of the world, religions have increased their influence, and then national identity and religious identity may influence each other quite significantly.

In some strands of postmodernism
Postmodernism
Postmodernism is a philosophical movement evolved in reaction to modernism, the tendency in contemporary culture to accept only objective truth and to be inherently suspicious towards a global cultural narrative or meta-narrative. Postmodernist thought is an intentional departure from the...

, nations are no longer viewed as legally enforced territories but as imagined communities
Imagined communities
Imagined communities are a concept coined by Benedict Anderson. He believes that a nation is a community socially constructed, imagined by the people who perceive themselves as part of that group...

 in which national identification becomes increasingly vaguer. Thus, for example, Michel Foucault
Michel Foucault
Michel Foucault , born Paul-Michel Foucault , was a French philosopher, social theorist and historian of ideas...

 claimed that in the West
Western world
The Western world, also known as the West and the Occident , is a term referring to the countries of Western Europe , the countries of the Americas, as well all countries of Northern and Central Europe, Australia and New Zealand...

, "the project of the science of the subject has
gravitated, in ever-narrowing circles, around the question of sex" (Foucault, The history of sexuality, Vol. 1, Vintage, p. 70). This could be understood to mean that people really identify more with sexuality
Human sexuality
Human sexuality is the awareness of gender differences, and the capacity to have erotic experiences and responses. Human sexuality can also be described as the way someone is sexually attracted to another person whether it is to opposite sexes , to the same sex , to either sexes , or not being...

 than nationality
Nationality
Nationality is membership of a nation or sovereign state, usually determined by their citizenship, but sometimes by ethnicity or place of residence, or based on their sense of national identity....

 nowadays.

Nevertheless, despite controversy, the concept of a "national psychology" still persists, insofar as people can observe practically e.g. through tourism
Tourism
Tourism is travel for recreational, leisure or business purposes. The World Tourism Organization defines tourists as people "traveling to and staying in places outside their usual environment for not more than one consecutive year for leisure, business and other purposes".Tourism has become a...

 and television
Television
Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...

 that there are definitely differences in the way people live life, and how they think about it, in different countries, quite apart from differences in physical appearance or language. There are nowadays books on the national character of practically every people on earth.

Further Reading

  • H.C.J. Duijker and N.H. Frijda, National character and national stereotypes, 1960.
  • W. Buchanan and H. Cantril, How nations see each other. UNESCO, 1953.
  • Siegfried Kracauer, "Les types nationaux vus par Holywood", in Revue Internationale de Filmologie, Vol. 2 no. 6.
  • Frederick Hertz, Nationality in history and politics; a study of the psychology and sociology of national sentiment and character, 1955
  • Wilhelm Wundt, Volkerpsychologie, 1900
  • Wilhelm Wundt, Die Nationen und ihre philosophie, 1916
  • Otto Klineberg, Tensions affecting international understanding. UNESCO, 1950.
  • Geoffrey Gorer, "The concept of national character", Science News, no. 18, 1950.
  • Geoffrey Gorer, "Modification of the national character: the role of the police in England", in: Douglas G. Haring, Personal character and cultural milieu", 1956, pp. 329-392.
  • Margaret Mead, "National Character", in: A. L. Kroeber, Anthropology Today: An Encyclopedic Inventory. Chicago: niversity of Illinois Press, 1952, pp. 642-667.
  • Alex Inkeles & Daniel J/ Levinson, "National Character: the study of modal personality and sociocultural systems". In: G. Lindzey & Eliott Aronson (eds.), The handbook of social psychology, Volume 4, 2nd edition. Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley, 1968.
  • Dean Peabody, National characteristics. Cambridge University Press, 1985.
  • Uichol Kim, Kuo-Shu Yang, Kwang-Kuo Hwang (eds.),Indigenous and cultural psychology. Springer, 2006.
  • A. Maurice Low, The American people, a study in national psychology. SPO, University of Michigan Library, 2005.
  • Martyn Barnett, Children's Knowledge, Beliefs and Feelings about Nations and National Groups. Psychology Press, 2006.
  • Constance Rourke, American Humor: A Study of the National Character. ACLS Humanities, 2008.
  • Karl E. Scheibe, Self studies: the psychology of self and identity. Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 1995.

See also

  • Culture by region
    Culture by region
    Cultures of the world is the aggregate of regional variations in culture, both by nation and ethnic group and more broadly, by larger regional variations. Similarities in culture often occur in geographically nearby peoples...

  • Ethnicity
  • Ethology
    Ethology
    Ethology is the scientific study of animal behavior, and a sub-topic of zoology....

  • Ethnology
    Ethnology
    Ethnology is the branch of anthropology that compares and analyzes the origins, distribution, technology, religion, language, and social structure of the ethnic, racial, and/or national divisions of humanity.-Scientific discipline:Compared to ethnography, the study of single groups through direct...

  • Racism
    Racism
    Racism is the belief that inherent different traits in human racial groups justify discrimination. In the modern English language, the term "racism" is used predominantly as a pejorative epithet. It is applied especially to the practice or advocacy of racial discrimination of a pernicious nature...

  • Meta-ethnicity
    Meta-ethnicity
    Meta-ethnicity is a relatively recent term that arises occasionally in academic literature or public discourse, and when it does, seems to be an attempt to describe a level of commonality that is wider and more general than ethnicity, but does not necessarily correspond to nation or...

  • Nationalism
    Nationalism
    Nationalism is a political ideology that involves a strong identification of a group of individuals with a political entity defined in national terms, i.e. a nation. In the 'modernist' image of the nation, it is nationalism that creates national identity. There are various definitions for what...

  • National character studies
    National Character Studies
    National character studies refers to a set of anthropological studies conducted during and directly after World War II that arose from the Culture and Personality School within psychological anthropology....

  • Patriotism
    Patriotism
    Patriotism is a devotion to one's country, excluding differences caused by the dependencies of the term's meaning upon context, geography and philosophy...

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