identification and perceived vitality: the dutch and the germans in the european union

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Identification andPerceived Vitality: TheDutch and the Germans inthe European UnionArnd Florack & Ursula PiontkowskiPublished online: 29 Mar 2010.

To cite this article: Arnd Florack & Ursula Piontkowski (1997) Identificationand Perceived Vitality: The Dutch and the Germans in the European Union,Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, 18:5, 349-363, DOI:10.1080/01434639708666325

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Identification and Perceived Vitality: TheDutch and the Germans in the EuropeanUnion

Arnd Florack and Ursula PiontkowskiDepartment of Psychology, University of Münster, Fliednerstr. 21 48149, Münster,Germany

This study examines the vitality perceptions of the Dutch and the Germans in thecontext of the progressive European unification with special emphasis on the relation-ship between subjective vitality perceptions and group identification. The vitalityperceptions were measured by a modified version of the Subjective Vitality Question-naire (Bourhis et al., 1981) while indicators for the ‘objective’ vitality were obtained byanalysing official statistics and surveys. Results indicate that despite a high correspon-dence of subjective vitality assessments and ‘objective realities’ an ingroup bias in thevitality perception emerged. On some subjective vitality items, the vitality assessmentsof individuals with a high national identification were higher in general, but nointensifying effect of national identification on the ingroup bias was found. Consen-sually, the Dutch and the Germans expected an increase of both groups’ vitality withinthe next 15 to 20 years. This can be taken as an indicator of culture optimism whichappears in spite of a simultaneously expected increase of the influence of the EuropeanUnion. The results are discussed with reference to recent findings and developmentsin vitality theory as well as with regard to European unification.

IntroductionThe concept of ‘ethnolinguistic vitality’ was introduced into intergroup

research by Giles et al. (1977). It is based on the assumption that relations betweenethnic groups do not occur in a vacuum, but are influenced by numeroussituational and sociostructural factors. The vitality of an ethnolinguistic groupwas defined as ‘that which makes a group likely to behave as a collective entitywithin the intergroup setting’ (Giles et al., 1977: 308). It was proposed that groupswith high vitality are most likely to thrive and remain distinct in an intergroupcontext, while groups with low vitality are in danger of functioning as isolatedindividuals. Sociostructural variables which seemed to be important with regardto the vitality of groups were combined into three general factors: social status,demography, and institutional support. The status variables contain mainly theprestige among ingroup and outgroup members as well as the economic wealthand the sociohistorical status. The demographic variables refer essentially to theregional concentration of group members and the numerical relation towardsoutgroups. The institutional support includes variables of the groups’ formal andinformal representation in regard to mass media, education, government servicesand others. All together, the variables were understood as indicators of groupvitality.

In the social psychological literature, the idea prevails that the cognitiverepresentation of the environment is not always congruent with the societalreality (Bruner, 1957; Moscovici, 1981; Triandis, 1972; Tversky & Kahneman,

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0143-4632/97/05 0349-15 $10.00/0 © 1997 A. Florack & U. PiontkowskiJOURNAL OF MULTILINGUAL AND MULTICULTURAL DEVELOPMENT Vol. 18, No. 5, 1997

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1980). Hence, it seems to be helpful to take the subjective vitality perceptions aswell as the objective vitality factors into account. The concept of subjective vitalityarose with the development of the Subjective Vitality Questionnaire (SVQ) byBourhis et al. (1981) and the Beliefs on Ethnolinguistic Vitality Questionnaire(BEVQ) by Allard and Landry (1986), which both seem to have sufficient validity(Allard & Landry, 1994).

Even if there was severe criticism (e.g. Husband & Kahn, 1982), the researchof the last decade shows the viability of the vitality construct. For example,Kraemer and Olsthain (1989) studied the ethnolinguistic vitality perceptions andlanguage attitudes of Jewish and Arab high school students in the Israeli setting.In Hong Kong, Pierson et al. (1987) investigated the English and Chinese vitalityperceptions. Giles et al. (1985) focused on the Australian setting. In Europe, Gilesand Johnson (1987) found that the vitality perceptions of Welsh bilinguals wererelated to language attitudes and the use of language. Other studies dealt withthe fit of the theoretical model and empirical data and with the internal andexternal validity of vitality questionnaires (e.g. Allard & Landry, 1994; Willemynset al., 1993). In addition, the vitality construct was included in several theoreticalmodels such as the ethnolinguistic identity theory of Giles and Johnson (1987) orthe model of bilingual development of Hamers and Blanc (1982). A frameworkfor further research was suggested by Harwood et al. (1994). They integratedvariables influencing the vitality assessment (e.g. objective vitality, societaluncertainty, social network, identification) as well as variables of the probableoutcomes of the vitality assessment (e.g. language behaviour, intergroupstrategies).

The present study examines the vitality perceptions of the Dutch and Germansin the context of European unification. In contrast to most studies concerningvitality perceptions, this study does not deal with language groups living indirect contact in one country, but with two national groups living in two separateneighbouring countries. The salience of this special intergroup relation has beenestablished through the context of European unification and the Treaty ofMaastricht which has been in force since 1993. The contract of Maastricht includesthe realisation of a common currency and a common policy as well ascomponents concerning the creation of a European Union (EU) citizenship andthe discontinuation of frontiers and customs.

Based on former results and adapted to the special context of the Dutch andthe Germans, the present study has four major objectives: first, investigation intowhether there is a strong correspondence between the objective vitalities and thesubjective assessments; secondly, examination of the bias of the ingroup andoutgroup members’ perceptions of the groups’ vitality; thirdly, consideration ofthe effects of identification on vitality perceptions; and fourthly, exploration ofthe expectations concerning the future vitality of both groups.

The first aim was to investigate the differences between the objective and thesubjective vitality of the Dutch and the Germans as assessed by the two groups.While some studies demonstrate a fair accuracy of the vitality assessments(Bourhis & Sachdev, 1984; Kraemer & Olshtain, 1989), others show strongaccentuations or attenuations of the vitality differences (e.g. Pierson et al., 1987).There are primary explanations for these contrasting results. Harwood et al.

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(1994) propose that in the absence of marked sociopolitical or economicinstability, subjective vitality assessments will broadly reflect the objectivevitality of groups. On the other hand, in the presence of societal instability therecan be considerable differences between the objective and subjective vitality. Inthis case groups may also differ in their vitality assessments.

The second objective was to investigate the biases in vitality assessmentswhich are previously documented in a number of studies concerning vitalityperceptions. Following social identity theory (Tajfel & Turner, 1979), it can beassumed that an individual’s desire for positive group identity has an impact onhow the ingroup and outgroup vitality is perceived. Hence, perceptions of singlevitality components should deviate from the ‘objective’ realities in a way whichleads to a more positive evaluation of the ingroup and a more negative evaluationof the outgroup. Previous studies provided contrasting results. While Bourhisand Sachdev (1984), and Kraemer and Olshtain (1989) found biases in favour ofingroup vitality, Sachdev et al. (1987) and Young et al. (1988) found biases infavour of outgroup vitality. The aim of our study was not to contradict thesecontrasting results, but just to explore the biased perceptions in this particularcontext.

Hitherto, little attention has been paid to the role of social identification in theprocess of vitality assessment with the exception of the studies of Ytsma et al.(1994) and Giles and Johnson (1987). Because of this lack in the vitality research,the third aim of this study was to investigate the influence of social identificationon the vitality perceptions. As Harwood et al. (1994) formulated, one hypothesismight be that a high level of attachment with one’s group could enhance theperceptual distortions which are described above. The theoretical explanation forthis is that the comparison with the outgroup is more important for individualswith high group identification than for those with low identification. Thus, forlow identified individuals a biased perception of the vitalities probably wouldnot bolster their positive social identity or their self-concept. As a consequence,such a bias is not expected. If it is assumed that the social identity principles areable to explain, both, the bias in favour of the ingroup as well as the bias in favourof the outgroup, an increased group identification should accentuate both effects.In fact, there is a small amount of research that shows that group identificationand subjective group vitality could be positively and negatively related (Ytsmaet al., 1994).

Further, it was of interest whether a common supra-group identification canneutralise the effect of the national identification. For the groups discussed, sucha supra-group identification is the identification with Europe while the groupidentification is the national identification.

The fourth objective was to see whether the present and future assessmentsdiffer in a consistent pattern. In previous studies, the future vitality has beenlargely ignored. Particularly, with regard to the progress of the Europeanunification, it seems an important question whether people see a decrease of theirnational groups’ vitality and whether a high or low present vitality affects theexpectations concerning the future vitality. For example, it can be assumed thatmembers of a high or low vitality group in this context expect a low or highdecrease of vitality.

Identification and Perceived Vitality 351D

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In the following part the Dutch and the German objective vitalities wereanalysed using data of official statistics and surveys.

Objective Vitality

StatusWithin the EU, Germany has the highest gross national product (27.6% of the

EU’s total GNP; 1600 thousand million ECU) followed by France (18.1%; 1000thousand million ECU) and Italy (14.3%; 850 thousand million ECU) (EURO-STAT — Schnellberichte, 5/1994). The Dutch GNP (4.5%; 260 thousand millionECU) is six times lower than Germany’s. Even in relationship to population theGNP of Germany is still higher. Not only in Europe, but also world-wide theGermans are a leading trading nation. In 1993, the only country ahead of themin regard to world trade was the USA. Germany exported goods to the value ofmore than 325 thousand million ECU (EUROSTAT, 1995), while they had importsof about 290 thousand million ECU. In the same year, the Dutch exported goodsto the value of 120 thousand million ECU, while they had an import of 110thousand million ECU. Analogous to the economical superiority, the Europeancitizens perceive the Germans generally as the nation in the EU with the higheststatus (Haeger, 1993).

Besides the prestige and the status of a group, the identification of groupmembers is an important indicator of vitality. In a Eurobarometer study, it wasfound that 87% of Germans felt at least to some degree attached to Germany while81% of Dutch felt the same to their nation (Eurobarometer, 36/1991). Blank andWiengarn (1994) investigated the pride of culture and history using German andDutch inhabitants living within a certain radius from their common border. Theyfound that the Dutch more frequently stated to be very proud of their historywhereas no such difference emerged concerning the question about culturalpride.

DemographyThe population statistics of both groups show a similar picture to that seen in

the economic comparisons. There are 81 million people in Germany (22% of theEU population) while the Netherlands have a population of only 15 millionpeople (4% of the EU population). The Germans live on an area of 357.000 squarekilometres (11% of the total EU area) while the Dutch live on an area of 42.000square kilometres (1.3% of the total EU area). However, the Netherlands have thehighest population density in the EU with 364 inhabitants per square kilometerwhereas Germany has ‘only’ 227 inhabitants per square kilometre.

In accordance with the population statistics, a higher status can be attributedto the Germans as a language group. In 1994, 24% of the people asked in arepresentative survey within the 12 former EU Member States stated that theyspeak German as their mother tongue while only 6% named Dutch as theirmother tongue (Eurobarometer, 41/1994). Among the interviewees, 8% believedthey spoke workable German even though it was not their mother tongue whileonly 1% stated this in regard to Dutch. When asked which foreign language theyhad learned, 2% answered Dutch whereas 15% German. In regard to the language


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status of Dutch and German, it must be mentioned that the English and Frenchlanguages are even more widespread.

When comparing the number of foreigners living in both countries, theNetherlands and Germany are not as different as they are in the other vitalitycomponents. In 1992, there were 0.8 million people living in the Netherlands whohad another nationality (the official statistics do not include people from theformer Dutch colonies, even if they could be subjectively perceived as foreigners)which represents 5.5% of the total population. At that time Germany had 6.1million foreigners which represents 7.6% of the total population (EUROSTAT —Schnellberichte, 7/1994).

Institutional supportIn nearly all institutions and executors of the EU, the Germans have a higher

number of members and votes than the Dutch. In the European Council, thecentral organ for resolution and direction, the Germans have 10 votes whereasthe Dutch have five. In the European Parliament, the Germans have 99 of the 567seats in contrast to the 31 Dutch seats (Woyke, 1995). In the EuropeanCommission, which among other things has the responsibility to control theexecution of the Community Rights and to represent the EU internationally, theGermans provide two and the Dutch one of the 17 commission members (Proskeet al., 1994). Figures that show that Germany has a more substantial influencewithin EU administration.

Besides the representation in government services, the representation of thegroups in cultural life and in the media was stated to be an important factor ofvitality. With regard to this, the use of objective indicators is extremely restricted,because studies in this field are largely unavailable. Hence, only indicators forcinema and electronic media will be considered here. In 1986 in the Netherlands,the amount of income earned from own film production was about 14% of totalincome from film production, while in Germany it was about 22% (Zimmer,1993). There are currently no statistics available for the export of Dutch filmproductions. However, in Germany there is an export, but it is largely restrictedto TV productions. Naturally, that is a lot lower if compared to the English orAmerican exports (Maggiore, 1991). It should be mentioned here thatBertelsmann is the company with the largest turnover in Europe, while the Dutchhave no company in the top ten (Meckel, 1994). Studies concerning the import ofTV programmes show something similar. In 1988, imports in the Netherlandswere 29% and in Germany 27% (Zimmer, 1993). With regard to futuredevelopments, an increase in the import of TV programmes is expected, due tothe expanding link up of cable networks creating additional opportunities for TVchannels from all European countries. Already in 1991, 4 million Dutchhouseholds and 9 million German households were receiving Europe-widebroadcasting channels such as Super Channel or MTV Europe (Zimmer, 1993).

The Survey Study

Research questionsIn line with the above objectives the following research questions were


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formulated to examine the correspondence between the subjective and objectivevitality of the Dutch and the Germans:

(1) Do the vitality assessments correspond to the objective vitality?

(2) Do the Dutch and the Germans differ in their vitality assessments of bothgroups and/or is there a bias in the perception of ingroup and outgroupvitalities?

(3) Does high national identification accentuate the differences in vitalityperception and does high European identification attenuate the differences?

(4) How do the Dutch and the Germans see their future vitalities?

MethodThe data presented here was collected in a large-scale study, designed to test

a complex vitality model empirically. Only those subjects and questionnairespertinent to the delimited objectives of this paper are described below.

SampleThe sample consisted of 89 Dutch and 104 German people. The average age

was 33.78 years (SD = 10.73) for the Dutch sub-sample and 36.97 years (SD =12.47) for the German. In both sub-samples, there was a higher proportion of menthan women (Dutch sub-sample: 60% men, 40% women; German sub-sample:75% men, 25% women). Subjects were recruited by asking Chambers ofCommerce and Trade to distribute questionnaires among course or meetingparticipants. Additionally, questionnaires were handed out to employees ofbusinesses selected at random. Of the questionnaires distributed, 28% werecompleted (25% in the Netherlands, 30% in Germany). Due to the recruitingprocedure, the sample only consisted of people in active employment. More than80% of the subjects in both sub-samples had positions in industry, trade,commerce or administration.

QuestionnaireTo measure the subjective vitality of the Dutch and Germans in the context of

the EU a modified version of the SVQ (Bourhis et al., 1981) was used. Subjectswere required to answer 14 questions in three domains: status, demography, andinstitutional support. As the future development of the two groups is seen to beof special importance, both the present perceptions (the state today) and thefuture expectations (the state in 15 to 20 years) were included. All questions wereasked with regard to the ingroup and the outgroup. With the exception of thequestions concerning the proportion of foreigners and the groups’ proportionwithin the EU, which had to be answered by estimating the percentages,respondents had to rate each question on four seven-point scales (the Dutchtoday, the Dutch in 15 to 20 years, the Germans today, the Germans in 15 to 20years). The poles of each scale were marked with opposite labels (‘not at all’ and‘exclusively’).

The measure of status included questions concerning the status within thegroup, within the EU, and world-wide as well as questions concerning the


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economical and political influence and the sociohistorical status. Regarding thedemographical factor, questions were asked about the groups’ proportionswithin the EU population, the proportion of foreigners living in both theNetherlands and Germany and about the basic knowledge of both languages.The institutional support was measured by the amount of representation theyreceived in official European services, in mass media, and in cultural life. Further,respondents were required to answer two questions concerning the overallvitality (activity in the EU and influence of the EU on daily life within theNetherlands and Germany).

Neither the Cronbach’s alphas for the overall vitalities nor for the status, thedemography, and the institutional support subscales seemed to be high enoughto sum up the single items into sub-scales (Cronbach’s alpha for the overallvitalities ranged from 0.64 to 0.73, the values for the sub-scales were all less than0.60). Therefore, the single items were included into analysis.

Three questions were asked about the identification with one’s group(‘national identification’) and the supra-group (‘European identification’). Onequestion captured the cognitive component of identification (How Dutch/Ger-man/ European do you feel? How much do you feel like a Dutch person/aGerman/a European?) whereas two questions captured the more affectivecomponent of identification (Do you like being Dutch/German/European?) (cf.Tajfel, 1981). As for the vitality questions, a bipolar seven-point scale was used.Cronbach’s alphas were, respectively, 0.90 for the national identification scaleand 0.88 for the European identification scale, showing a good reliability of thescales. Therefore, for further analysis the respective items were summed up intotwo scales.

Finally, questions concerning the sample description (age, profession, nation-ality) were asked.

Subjects received the questionnaire in their native language. The items wereformulated in German and then translated into Dutch. To ensure the equivalenceof the two versions, the Dutch version was corrected by back-translation intoGerman.

ResultsTo test the differences in the subjective vitality perceptions for statistical

significance a multivariate analysis of variance procedure with three groupfactors (Dutch/German group, high/low European identification and high/lownational identification) and two repeated measures (subjects’ ratings of theDutch/German target and subjects ratings of the present/future state) was used.The subjects were divided into high and low identification groups using a mediansplit.

While the overall MANOVA showed only one significant second orderinteraction (‘group’ by ‘target’ by ‘present/future vitality’; (F(14,139) = 1.92, p <0.05) significant first order interactions at the 0.001 level were found for ‘group’by ‘target vitality’ (F(14, 139) = 5.62), ‘target vitality’ by ‘present/future vitality’(F(14, 139) = 4.38), and ‘group’ by ‘national identification’ (F(14 139) = 5.62).Significant overall main effects emerged for ‘present/future vitality’ (F(14,139) =59.74) as well as for ‘target vitality’ (F(14,139) = 59.75) at the 0.001 level and for


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‘national identification’ (F(14,139) = 2.69) at the 0.01 level. There was nosignificant effect for ‘European identification’.

Due to the inadequate reliabilities of the overall vitality scales and thesub-scales, univariate ANOVAs were computed for all single items. The resultsfor each research question are presented separately below.

Perception of the Dutch and the German vitalitiesAs is shown in Table 1 , there were significant target main effects for all vitality

items with the exception of the estimated proportion of foreigners. Taking themean values into consideration, this means that the Dutch and Germansperceived the German vitality as being higher than the Dutch vitality. Theexceptions are that the subjects rated the Dutch to be more proud of their historyand that the EU has less influence on their daily life.

Differences between the Dutch and the German assessments and/orbetween ingroup and outgroup assessments

The question whether there are differences in the Dutch and German vitalityassessment is answered by analysing the target by group interaction. Significantunivariate interaction effects were found on the items concerning pride of culture,pride of history, economical influence, and the overall vitality (cf. Table 2).

The Germans perceived the Dutch as having more cultural pride while theDutch had the very opposite perceptions. For pride of history, both the Germans

SVQ items German vitality(mean)

Dutch vitality (mean)

Significant F-values (1152)

StatusPride of culture 4.64 4.52 *5.81Pride of history 3.62 4.61 ***27.91 Prestige (world) 4.58 3.74 ***34.85 Prestige (Europe) 4.51 4.02 ***24.80 Economical influence 5.53 3.49 ***337.56 Political influence 5.10 3.27 ***234.78

Demography% EU-population 18.46 7.78 ***371.06 % Foreigners 15.73 16.21Language in the EU 3.72 1.98 ***269.26

Institutional supportEU government services 4.64 3.50 ***111.75 Cultural life 4.32 3.63 ***40.19 Media 4.68 3.43 ***177.77

Overall vitalityInfluence of the EU 4.25 4.04 *6.13Overall vitality 5.06 4.31 ***37.01

*p < 0.05; *** p < 0.001

Table 1 Means and significant F-values for the assessments of the Dutch and theGerman vitalities


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and the Dutch rated the Dutch as being more proud of their history, though in adirect comparison of the means it appeared that in regard to pride of history andpride of culture the Dutch evaluated the Germans higher than the Germansthemselves and reverse. This means that the self-perceptions were lower than theperceptions from outgroup members. A difference between ingroup andoutgroup perceptions was found for economic influence and overall vitality aswell. The Dutch see the Germans as having less economic influence than theGermans themselves think they have, whereas there was no significant differencein the estimation of the Dutch economic influence. Analogous, the Dutch see theGermans as having a lower overall vitality as the Germans themselves think.However, for the estimation of the Dutch vitality it was found that the Germansrated the Dutch vitality higher than the Dutch did themselves. To summarise,especially the estimation of the German vitality showed strong differencesbetween ingroup and outgroup perceptions.

Identification and vitality perceptionsTo answer the question whether identification modifies the relation between

group membership and vitality perception the interaction between target bygroup by national/European identification was analysed. No such effect wasfound. However, national identification showed significant main effects oncultural and historical pride as well as on the assessment of the proportion offoreigners (cf. Table 3). Subjects with a high national identification rated both theGerman and the Dutch vitality concerning cultural and historical pride higherand concerning the proportion of foreigners lower than people with a lownational identification.

SVQ items German vitality Dutch vitality F-Values(1152)German

raters(mean)

Dutchraters(mean)

Germanraters(mean)

Dutchraters(mean)

Pride of culture 4.14 5.23 4.80 4.20 ***46.20Pride of history 3.28 4.02 4.70 4.49 **9.41Economical influence 5.77 5.24 3.50 3.48 *4.64Overall vitality 5.27 4.81 4.20 4.44 **8.60

* p < 0.05; ** p < 0.01; *** p < 0.001;

Table 2 Means and F-values for the group x target interaction effects

SVQ items Vitality assessments F-values (1152)Low groupidentification

(mean)

High groupidentification

(mean)Pride of culture 4.24 4.88 **13.82Pride of history 3.81 4.39 **16.00% foreigners 13.36 18.10 *5.59Overall vitality 3.96 4.15 *4.58

* p < 0.05; ** p < 0.001

Table 3 Means and F-values for the national identification main effects


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In addition, there were significant group by national identification interactionsconcerning the prestige in Europe (F(1,152) = 12.13; p < 0.01) and the overallvitality (F(1,152) = 5.61; p < 0.05). For the Dutch, the national identification had adifferent effect on these ratings than for the Germans. Low identified Dutch ratedthe prestige in Europe of both groups as less high than high identified Dutch,(low identification: M = 3.83; high identification: M = 4.53), whereas, conversely,Germans with a high national identification estimated the prestige of both groupsas less high than Germans with a low national identification (low identification:M = 4.45; high identification: M = 4.26). Exactly the same results were found inregard to the overall vitality. The low identified Dutch saw the overall vitality ofthe groups as lower than the high identified Dutch (low identification: M = 4.44;high identification: M = 4.72) while Germans with low national identificationtended to perceive an increased overall vitality (low identification: M = 4.86; highidentification: M = 4.59).

Present and future vitality perceptionsFor nine items significant differences between the assessments of the present

and the future vitality occurred. Only the items pride of history, economicinfluence, political influence and proportion of the EU population showed nosignificant differences (cf. Table 4). For the significant items, with exception ofthe items ‘proportion of foreigners’ and ‘influence of the EU’ Germans and Dutchexpected the future vitality of both groups to be higher than at present. Contrary,for the proportion of foreigners and the influence of the EU an increase wasexpected which can be seen as a decrease of these vitality components.

SVQ items Present vitality(mean)

Future vitality(mean)

Significant F-values (1152)

StatusPride of culture 4.65 4.51 **7.23Pride of history 4.08 4.15, Prestige (world) 4.05 4.20 *5.50Prestige (europe) 4.23 4.38 **7.87Economical influence 4.50 4.52, Political influence 4.13 4.24

Demography% EU population 13.18 13.07% foreigners 13.67 18.23 ***57.85Language in the EU 2.70 3.00 ***37.51

Institutional supportEU government services 3.96 4.17 ***12.86Cultural life 3.89 4.04 ***12.85Media 3.98 4.11 **7.08

Overall vitalityInfluence of the EU 3.79 4.50 ***114.23Overall vitality 4.53 4.84 ***20.39

* p < 0.05; ** p < 0.01; *** p < 0.001

Table 4 Means and significant F-values for present and future vitality assessments


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The main effect for present/future vitality is qualified by the present/futurevitality by target interaction for pride of history, language distribution, EUgovernment services, and the overall vitality (cf. Table 5). In Germany as well asin the Netherlands, the representation of the Germans in EU government serviceswas perceived to be higher than the representation of the Dutch. Taking theinteraction effect into account, in general a stronger increase of the Germanrepresentation was expected. Similarly, both the Germans and the Dutchexpected that the use of the German language will increase a lot more than theuse of the Dutch language just as, today, the German language is alreadyperceived to be a lot more widespread. The same was found for the overall vitalityratings. For pride of culture, there is in fact a decrease expected in Dutch culturalpride. To summarise, both Germans and Dutch expected a stronger increase inthe German vitality.

DiscussionThe first objective of this study has been whether subjective vitality assess-

ments are congruent with the objective vitality indicators. The analysis ofobjective vitality indicators showed that the objective vitality of the Germansconcerning most criteria is higher than the Dutch vitality. The subjective vitalityassessments corresponded, both in the Netherlands and in Germany, to these‘objective’ findings. These results that are found in many studies (e.g. Giles et al.,1985; Kraemer & Olshtain, 1989; Ytsma et al., 1994) are contradicted by the studyof Pierson et al. (1987) in which marked intergroup differences occurred. In thatstudy, Chinese and Western students’ vitality perceptions were examined duringa period of political negotiation about Hong Kong’s future. Harwood et al. (1994)argue that in such a context of societal instability and social change individualstend to seek information within their own groups which leads to an intragroupfocus in vitality assessment and different dimensions and sources of assessment.As a result of this process marked intergroup differences in the degree ofcross-group consensus in vitality assessments should occur. Transferring thisargumentation to the situation of the Dutch and the Germans in Europe, it couldbe assumed that the political and economical changes do not coincide with theperception of a high degree of societal uncertainty. Due to the fact that thisassumption was not tested in this study, further work is required to discovermore about the perception of societal uncertainty and its correlation to intergroupdifferences in vitality assessments.

In spite of the general correspondence between objective vitality and

SVQ items German vitality Dutch vitality F-values(1152)Present

(mean)Future(mean)

Present(mean)

Future(mean)

Pride of history 3.45 3.78 4.69 4.51 ***26.74Language in the EU 3.50 3.94 1.90 2.06 ***19.49EU government services 4.48 4.80 3.44 3.54 ***13.55Overall vitality 4.85 5.26 4.19 4.42 *5.97

* p < 0.05; ** p < 0.01; *** p < 0.001

Table 5 Means and F-values for the present/future x target interaction effects


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subjective assessments, the Dutch and the Germans did not agree on the intensityof vitality differences on some items. With regard to the second aim of this study,the investigation of the bias of the ingroup and outgroup members’ perceptionsof the groups’ vitality, it is of interest to look for particular patterns of theseperceptual distortions. Considering these particular differences, the self-stereo-types of cultural and historical pride were not congruent with the outgroupassessments. The outgroup assessments were higher than the ingroup assess-ments (the Dutch perceived the Germans’ pride higher than the Germansthemselves, conversely, the Germans saw the Dutch pride as higher than theDutch did). Regarding the overall vitality and the economic status the ingroupassessments were higher than the outgroup assessments. Taking into accountthat a high overall vitality and a high economic status have a positive connotationwhereas national pride may be negatively evaluated if it appears to be too strong,these differences in vitality assessment can be seen as a kind of the ingroup biasphenomenon which has been found in several earlier studies, too (e.g. Rabbie &Horwitz, 1969; Tajfel et al., 1971). In line with the social identity theory (Tajfel &Turner, 1979) which defines the positive evaluation of the ingroup and thenegative evaluation of the outgroup as a bias in perception caused by the strivefor positive social identity, our findings could be interpreted as an effect ofingroup-outgroup categorisation. Besides this, following the social cognitionresearch it could be argued that an ideal could lead to a selective search forinformation and, as a consequence, to a bias in perception in the direction of apreferred reality (Hamilton, 1981; Nisbett & Ross, 1979). Therefore, the overesti-mation of the ingroup vitality and the underestimation of the outgroup vitalitycould also be seen as a consequence of a selective search for information. Despitethese arguments, it remains an open question why the ingroup bias phenomenondid not appear for all vitality components and why in several other studiesperceptual distortions in favour of the outgroup were found (Sachdev et al., 1987;Young et al., 1988). Even if there are attempts to answer these open questions,these explanations work only in a very specific context such as the concept ofcontrast accentuation which was proposed by Sachdev et al. (1987) for the case ofperceived change in ingroup and outgroup vitality. An aim for further researchcould be to analyse variables which could have an influence on the directions ofsuch biases.

The third objective of this study was to investigate the effect of socialidentification on the vitality perceptions. First, it could not be confirmed that thelevel of group or supra-group identification accentuated or attenuated thedescribed ingroup bias in the perception of vitality. In addition, no effect of thesupra-group identification was found at all. However, a main effect of groupidentification appeared for cultural and historical pride and the assessment ofthe proportion of foreigners. On these three items, the vitality assessments of highidentified individuals are higher in general, independently of the ingroup oroutgroup perspectives. One possible explanation for this is based on theassumption that the vitality of a group contributes more to the self concept ofhigh than of low identified individuals and that therefore the vitality of theingroup or of the outgroup is more salient (cf. Kraemer & Olshtain, 1989). Theincreased salience should lead further to a higher representation of information


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about vitality and consequently to a higher vitality assessment. An explanationfor the finding that the national identification had no intensifying effect on theappeared perceptual distortions is not available. This could be taken as anargument against the pure transfer of social identity principles to this particularsetting without taking other influencing variables into account.

The fourth point of interest of this study was to consider the future vitalityassessments. With regard to this topic, the results show a kind of culturaloptimism. As regards nearly all vitality components, it is expected consensuallythat the vitality of both nations will increase within the next 15 to 20 years. Thisfinding is surprising, as there is a positive but no negative correlation betweenthe expected increase of overall vitality and the expected increase of the influenceof the EU (r = 0.28; p < 0.001). Therefore, a strong EU and a vital national groupseem to be compatible. This is in accord with the assumption of the biculturalismmodel of LaFromboise et al. (1993). They postulate that individuals can belong totwo different cultures without choosing one of them. In line with that, the nationand Europe are not exclusive categories.

To summarise, first, this study, as several other studies before, has shown thatthe relation between objective vitality and the subjective perception is qualifiedby complex interactions. Group identification is only one of them. Hence, oneconclusion of this article might be that the relationships between the mentionedvariables are by far not clear. Further research is needed to build up and test acomplex integrative vitality model similar to the one proposed by Harwood etal. (1994). Secondly, the results of this study indicate that the expected futurevitality is a component which needs to be taken into account in further surveysand wider research questions. Thirdly, in this study the vitality concept wasapplied in a context which has not been investigated up until now. The vitalityconcept is not only useful for the investigation of ethnolinguistic groups, but alsofor almost every kind of intergroup settings. Further research in the vitality areaought to be stimulated in order to enlarge the amount of empirical data regardingother groups and settings.

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identification and perceived vitality: the dutch and the germans in the european union

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