Young People's National Identity And Its Tendency To Individualism / Collectivism

Each person in society belongs to more than one social group different in size,status and so on. Individuals identify certain group through depersonalization, whichinfluences one's self-concept and behavior. Nation is a wide and complex group.Phinney defined national identity as "one's sense or belonging to an ethnic groups andthe part of one's thinking, perception, feelings, and behavior that is due to ethnic groupmembership", which includes a member's personal identity, the sense of belonging andattachment to own group, and attitudes to and participation in traditional activities .It's necessary and interesting to examine the nature of adolescent' nationalidentity as it should help the educators cultivate their collective consciousness and thesense of social responsibility. This study is of great importance especially tocontemporary Chinese adolescent and the educators because of the eventful socialtransition taking place in China now.The purposes of this study are to examine the natures of han nationalityadolescents' identity to Chinese nation, the differences between adolescents andparents in Chinese national identity, the relationship between adolescents and parents'Chinese national' identity, and horizontal and vertical individualism and collectivismbasing on Tajfel and Turner's social identity theory, self-categorization theory andPhinney's three phases developmental model.1352 adolescents in grade two from four junior high schools, three senior highschools and three universities and 624 adults (the parents concerned) were investigated,and their average ages were14.34, 17.46, 20.34 and 42.16 respectively. The mainconclusions are as follows:1. The junior high school samples reported significantly higher levels in nationalidentity and its cognitive and behavior dimensions than the senior high schoolsamples and university samples, and no significant differences were found betweenthe last two groups. On emotional dimension, the junior high school samplesscored significantly higher than the senior high school samples, while the seniorhigh school samples scored significantly higher than the university samples.2. Whether examined alone or with parents, urban samples scored significantly higherthan rural and county samples on national identity as a whole, and on its' emotional,cognitive and behavior dimensions. No difference was found between rural andcounty samples.3. Parents scored higher than adolescents on Chinese national identity as a whole andon its' cognitive and behavior dimensions. No significant generation difference wasfound in emotional dimension to national identity. Generation differences weremodified by location, and the results indicated that urban parents were moreinclined to identify with Chinese nation as a whole and its three dimensions as wellthan urban adolescencts;county samples exhibited generation differences only incognitive and behavior dimensions, and no generation difference was found in ruralsamples.4. For Adolescents samples, Chinese national identity as a whole and its threedimensions positively related to vertical and horizontal collectivism and verticalindividualism respectively. There was no significant co-relation with verticalindividualism. The emotional and cognitive dimensions positively predict verticaland horizontal collectivism and vertical individualism significantly aftercontrolling for the age and location factors. The behavioral dimension positivelypredict vertical and horizontal collectivism significantly, however, it can'tsignificantly predict vertical individualism.5. For parent samples, the relations between Chinese national identity as a whole andits three dimensions and vertical and horizontal collectivism and verticalindividualism were the same as that of the adolescents samples. The emotionaldimension positively predict vertical collectivism after controlling for the genderand location factors, however, it can't significantly predict vertical individualismand horizontal collectivism. The cognitive and behavioral dimensions positivelypredict vertical and horizontal collectivism and vertical individualism significantly.Finally,the conclusions 'revelation to theory and reality was discussed and thestudy's limination and the research oriention in the future were introduced.