The Acquisition of National Identity: A Comparison of In-country and Overseas(Chinese, Russia and Japan Residents) Korean Adolescents

청소년의 민족정체감 조사 비교 - 한국, 중국, 소련, 일본 거주 청소년을 중심으로 -

The purpose of this study was to investigate methodological and theoretical problems in measuring the acquisition of national identity of in-country and over-seas Korean adolescents. The subjects consisted of 574 incountry and overseas (Chinese, Russia and Japan) Korean adolescents (total 509), 15 to 25 years of age. Data were collected with the use of a questionaire, the Scale of National Identity. The results were that (1) the concept of national identity was organized on two dimensions (cognitive vs. sociocultural). The former consisted of 6 cognitive characteristics (uniqueness, sameness, continuity, acceptability, respectability and royalty). The sociocultural dimension consisted of the cognition of 7 sociocultural characteristics (history, norm, fraternity, symbol, consanguinity, Korean language and nationality). Except for consanguinity, there was a close relationship within each and between the 6 cognitive characteristics. Also there was a close relationship within each and between the 7 sociocultural characteristics of national identity. (2) Some demographic variables, such as age of respondents, place of birth and level of understanding of Korean language contributed to acquisition of national identity. (3) Among several demographic variables, nationality was the most explainable.