National psychology

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National psychology refers to the (real or alleged) distinctive psychological make-up of particular nations, ethnic groups or peoples, and to the comparative study of those characteristics.

The assumption of national psychology is that different etnnic groups are characterized by a different, distinctive "mix" of human attitudes, values, emotions, motivation and abilities which is culturally reinforced.

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" or the "soul" of a nation, to explain why a 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 or cultural practice. The idea is, that a nation shares a specific cultural mentality, morality or mindset, embedded in its language 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.

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 and fascist generalisations about people, i.e. arbitrary discrimination between people in accordance with some prejudice or personal interest, which obstructs the acceptance of people as they are. For example, "Africans are lazy", "the Dutch are stingy", "Americans are greedy", "the French are romantic" etc.

• Scientifically, because it is in reality very difficult to describe and generalise about ethnic differences in a valid and objective way. Part of the problem is that researchers interpret another culture from the point of view of the culture they are used to, and even if many people in a country share a common psychological or biological characteristic, other people in that country may not have that characteristic at all. Psychologists have found in research that when subjects are asked to identify the ethnicity or nationality of a line-up of different people, they cannot acccurately recognize it. Marketing and Media experts have found that at most people can identify a representative stereotype or archetype which symbolises a particular ethnic group.

Two 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.

• large-scale international migration 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.

Some writers argue that in the era of globalisation, national or ethnic differences can less and less explain why people behave as they do.

Nevertheless, the concept of a "national psychology" persists, insofar as people can observe e.g. through tourism 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.