The Effects of Education, Sex and Residential Background on National Identity of Bangladeshi People

Abstract

The present study was an attempt to investigate national identity of Bangladeshi people affected by sex, education and residential background. Several theoretical imports represented the underlying theme of the study. Thus psychoanalytic theory, learning theory, value-motive-trait theory and cognitive theory were interrelated with national identity. The specific objectives aimed at this study were (i) To provide on analytical presentation of different aspects of national identity in Bangladeshi people. (ii) To focus on males and females as agents for creating different factors of national identity in Bangladeshi people. (iii) To reflect on education such as secular education and religious education as agents of national identity (iv) To study the residential background such as urban and rural for effecting changes in national identity of Bangladeshi people. (v) To investigate some factors such as helpfulness, ingratiation, internationalism, traditionalism, nationalism democracy, authoritarianism, patriotism, and family togetherness positively correlated with national identity of Bangladeshi people. Though the study was an explorative in nature, the specific hypotheses were formulated. These were as follows: (i) Male respondents would show more integrative national identity as compared to female respondents. (ii) Respondents with religious education would show more integrative national identity as compared to respondents with secular education. (iii) Respondents with urban residential background would show more integrative national identity as compared to respondents with rural residential background. A total of 400 respondents constituted the sample of the study. Respondents were students of different institutions situated in Rajshahi city. They were equally divided into two groups. The first group included those students who belonged to institutions with secular education. The second group included those students who belonged to institutions with religious education. Each group was equally divided into males and females. Each category of males and females included equal number of respondents belonging to urban and rural residential background. A National Identity Scale (NIS) was developed as instrument for data collection. The instrument was constructed using factor analytic method. Statistical programmed was used for factor analysis of 90 items with 800 respondents. The principal component analysis was used as a data reduction method. Thus 9 factors were extracted. These were named as (i) traditionalism, (ii) internationalism, (iii) family togetherness, (iv) authoritarianism, (v) democracy (vi) nationalism, (vii) patriotism, (viii) helpfulness and (ix) ingratiation. Final form of the scale included 38 items. The results of the study were computed in three parts. In the first part, the total score of National Identity Scale (NIS) was subjected to 2X2X2 ANOVA representing 2 levels of sex (male/female), 2 levels of education (secular/religious) and 2 levels of residential background (urban/rural). In the second part, scores of National Identity Scale on each dimension were subjected to 2X2X2 ANOVA representing 2 levels of sex (male/female), 2 levels of education (secular/religious) and 2 levels of residential background (urban/rural). In the third part, inter-dimension comparisons were computed using t-test. The results obtained strongly supported H2 and H3• But H1 was partially supported by the findings. Respondents with religious education expressed significantly more integrative national identity as compared to the respondents with secular education. Similarly, respondents with urban residential background expressed significantly more integrative national identity as compared to the respondents with rural residential background. In spite of these findings, wide arrays of complex findings have been obtained in this study. It was found that respondents with religious education expressed significantly more traditionalism, more family togetherness, more authoritarianism, and more nationalism. Respondents with secular education, on the other hand, expressed significantly higher attitudinal preference for internationalism and ingratiation. These findings gave the salience of religious education in the formation of attitude structure in the context of Bangladesh. In other words, religious education played a definite role in the formation of national identity. In conclusion, the findings of the present study revealed with considerable clarity that a phenomenon as complex as national identity is intimately embedded in the matrix of socio-contextual factors such as sex, education and residence. Thus the relative strength of traditionalism, internationalism, family togetherness, authoritarianism, democracy, nationalism, patriotism, helpfulness and ingratiation were mingled together as elements of national identity in the social, cultural and political context of Bangladesh.