Collective Identity - Collective Identity in Social Psychology

Collective Identity in Social Psychology

See also: social identity theory and social identity approach

Social psychologists has had interest in concepts of identity and individuality since its early days, tracing as far back as to the work of George Mead. His theories focused on the relationship between individual identity and society. He theorizes a chicken-and-egg relationship between society and identity. Prexisting social structure and conditions shape a person’s identity, which in turn, interacts with others and shapes the new and emerging social structure.

More contemporarily, Polletta and Jasper defined collective identity as “an individual’s cognitive, moral, and emotional connections with a broader community, category, practice, or institution.” The collective identity of a group are often expressed through the group’s cultures and traditions. The origin of the identity can be from within the group or outside the group, but ultimately, a collective identity is only formed upon the group members’ acceptance of the identity.Though defining collective identity to be a self-central concept, they emphasize on its distinction from concepts like ideology, motivation, and personal identity.

Not to be confused with social identity theory or self-categorization theory, collective identity focuses on the identity of the group as a whole, while the other theories focus on the identity of an individual(self)’s association with a group.

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