Children's Knowledge, Beliefs and Feelings About Nations and National Groups

This book provides a state-of-the-art account of how people's subjective sense of national identity, and attitudes towards countries and national groups, develop through the course of childhood and adolescence. It offers a comprehensive review of the research which has been conducted into:

. children's understanding of nations as geographical territories and as political, historical and cultural communities

. children's knowledge, beliefs and feelings about the people who belong to different national groups

. children's attitudes towards, and emotional attachment to, their own country and national group.

The authors elaborate on the developmental patterns that have been found to emerge, contextualized by a consideration and evaluation of the theoretical frameworks which can be used to explain these patterns.

Written by the leading international authority in this field, and reporting (in collaboration with his colleagues) the findings from two major transnational research projects, this book will be invaluable to postgraduate students and researchers working in this field. The book will also be of great benefit to undergraduate students taking courses in Developmental Psychology, the Sociology of Childhood, and Education.

Martyn Barrett is Professor of Psychology at the University of Surrey. He has worked extensively on the development of language and on children's drawings. More recently he has been working on national and ethnic enculturation in childhood and adolescence, the development of prejudice and stereotyping in children and adolescents, and acculturation processes in ethnic minority individuals.