Nationalism and patriotism: the effects of national identification on implicit and expicit in-group bias

The effects of a positive national identification on implicit and explicit out-group evaluations are explored. We draw the distinction between two varieties of national attachment: nationalism and patriotism. Consistent with past research (e.g., Blank & Schmidt, 2003; Mummendey, Klink & Brown, 2001) we contend that the way in which national identification is constructed (i.e., in terms of nationalism or patriotism) affects negative out-group attitudes. We explore this through three separate yet related issues: 1) by examining the relationship between a positive national identity and implicit and explicit in-group bias; 2) by examining the mean level of implicit and explicit out-group evaluations; and 3) by observing the pattern of correspondence between implicit and explicit measures. A series of correlational (Studies la, b, c, d) and experimental (Studies 2b, 3, 4) studies support the argument that the way in which national identification is constructed affects negative out-group evaluations. Specifically, Studies la-d illustrated that nationalism and patriotism were separate yet related varieties of national attachment and that they diverged in their prediction of xenophobia. Nationalism, but not patriotism, was reliably related to xenophobia. Studies 2b-4 generally converged in illustrating that nationalism and patriotism lead to differential links between identification and implicit out-group derogation and differential strength of correspondence between implicit and explicit measures. The link between identification and implicit in-group bias and implicit-explicit correspondence were reliably stronger following the nationalism than the patriotism frames. Additionally, we conducted a meta-analytic integration (Study 5) of the current research on implicit-explicit correspondence to ascertain whether a salient inter-group context (as was accessible under our experimental nationalism frames) could reliably predict variation in implicit-explicit correspondence. Amongst other findings, we found a large positive link between the salience of an inter-group context and implicit-explicit correspondence. The implications for current theoretical debate on national identification and in-group bias in general, and for research on implicit- explicit correspondence in particular, are discussed and possible directions for future research are outlined.