National identifications and attitudes to national ingroups and outgroups amongst children living in the Basque Country

Abstract

This study investigated the development of national identification in children growing up in the Basque Country. The sample consisted of 246 children aged 6, 9, 12 and 15 years old who belonged to three linguistic subgroups: children who spoke only Basque with their parents in their home, children who spoke only Spanish in their home, and children who spoke both Basque and Spanish in their home. It was found that national identifications differed in the three linguistic subgroups. Furthermore, the three subgroups exhibited different evaluations of, and feelings towards, the national ingroup and a number of national outgroups. The positive and affective distinctiveness ascribed to the Basque and Spanish national groups was correlated with the strength of identification with the Basque and Spanish groups respectively. The attitudes towards national outgroups which were exhibited by these children did not show any changes as a function of age. It is argued that the cognitive-developmental account of the development of national attitudes is unable to explain the patterns of findings which were obtained, but that social identity theory can explain the correlation between the strength of national identification and the positive and affective distinctiveness which was ascribed to the ingroup.

Full text

Infant and Child Development (2004), 13, 1-20.
National Identifications and Attitudes to National Ingroups and Outgroups amongst
Children living in the Basque Country
Luixa Reizábal*, Jose Valencia* & Martyn Barrett**
* Faculty of Psychology, University of the Basque Country
** Department of Psychology, University of Surrey, UK
Running head: National identifications and attitudes in Basque children
Address for correspondence: Martyn Barrett, Department of Psychology, University of
Surrey, Guildford, Surrey GU2 7XH, UK. Email: m.barrett@surrey.ac.uk. Tel: 01483-
686862. Fax: 01483-689553.
Acknowledgements: The research reported in this paper was supported by two grants
received from the University of the Basque Country (Grant No. UPV 227.231-
ha030/98) and the Basque Government (Grant No. PI 1999-103) and by a grant
received from INTAS (Grant No. OPEN-97-1363) which was awarded to the
Universities of Surrey, Dundee, Girona, Malaga and Basque Country and to the Russian
Academy of Sciences, Kharkov State University, the Georgian Institute of Psychology
and the Azerbaijan Pedagogical Institute for Russian Language and Literature. We are
very grateful to the following colleagues who have contributed to this programme of
research: Mark Bennett, Ignasi Vila, Almudena Giménez de la Peña, Tatiana
Riazanova, Valentina Pavlenko, Giorgi Kipiani and Rauf Karakazov.

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National Identifications and Attitudes to National Ingroups and Outgroups amongst
Children living in the Basque Country
Abstract
This study investigated the development of national identification in children
growing up in the Basque Country. The sample consisted of 246 children aged 6, 9, 12
and 15 years old who belonged to three linguistic subgroups: children who spoke only
Basque with their parents in their home, children who spoke only Spanish in their home,
and children who spoke both Basque and Spanish in their home. It was found that
national identifications differed in the three linguistic subgroups. Furthermore, the three
subgroups exhibited different evaluations of, and feelings towards, the national ingroup
and a number of national outgroups. The positive and affective distinctiveness ascribed
to the Basque and Spanish national groups was correlated with the strength of
identification with the Basque and Spanish groups respectively. The attitudes towards
national outgroups which were exhibited by these children did not show any changes as
a function of age. It is argued that the cognitive-developmental account of the
development of national attitudes is unable to explain the patterns of findings which
were obtained, but that social identity theory can explain the correlation between the
strength of national identification and the positive and affective distinctiveness which
was ascribed to the ingroup.
Keywords: national identity, national attitudes, positive distinctiveness, social identity

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National Identifications and Attitudes to National Ingroups and Outgroups amongst
Children living in the Basque Country
This paper reports a study which investigated the development of national
identification in children who are growing up in the Basque Country in the Spanish State.
The study focused in particular upon the relationship between the children’s own
national identifications and the evaluative and affective attitudes which they exhibited
towards their national ingroup and a number of national outgroups.
Previous studies of children’s national identification have found that children
usually begin to categorise themselves as members of their own national group from
about 5 or 6 years of age, when they also start to express attitudes towards the members
of other national groups (Barrett, 1996, 2001, in press; Jahoda, 1962; Jaspers, van de
Geer, Tajfel & Johnson, 1972; Johnson, Middleton & Tajfel, 1970; Lambert &
Klineberg, 1967; Middleton, Tajfel & Johnson, 1970; Piaget & Weil, 1951; Tajfel &
Jahoda, 1966; Tajfel, Jahoda, Nemeth, Campbell & Johnson, 1970). During subsequent
years, children’s knowledge of the people who belong to different national groups
expands considerably, and by 10 or 11 years of age children are able to produce detailed
descriptions of the characteristics exhibited by members of their own and other national
groups, including their typical physical features and appearance, clothing, language,
behavioural habits, psychological traits, and political and religious beliefs (Barrett &
Short, 1992; Lambert & Klineberg, 1967; Piaget and Weil, 1951).
The acquisition of this knowledge about national groups during middle
childhood is typically accompanied by the acquisition of a systematic preference for
members of the national ingroup over members of national outgroups (Barrett, 2001, in
press; Bennett, Lyons, Sani & Barrett, 1998; Lambert & Klineberg, 1967; Tajfel et al.,
1970). However, some national outgroups may still be positively liked and evaluated,
although to a lesser extent than the ingroup (Barrett & Short, 1992; Johnson et al.,
1970; Lambert & Klineberg, 1967; Middleton et al., 1970). Once a relative order of
liking of national outgroups has been established, this order tends to remain stable and
consistent across the remaining childhood years (Barrett & Short, 1992; Jaspers et al.,
1972; Johnson et al., 1970). However, the overall degree of liking of all national
outgroups tends to increase between 5 and 11 years of age (Barrett & Short, 1992;
Lambert & Klineberg, 1967). After 11 years of age, this general increase in positive
regard for other national groups typically levels out (Lambert & Klineberg, 1967).
It is noteworthy that this increase in positive regard for national outgroups
occurs at the same time as the increase in positive regard for ethnic outgroups amongst
white majority group children. It has been argued that negativity towards ethnic
outgroups in such children peaks at about 6 years of age, and declines between 6 and 12
years of age (Aboud, 1988; Bigler & Liben, 1993; Davey 1983; Katz & Zalk, 1978;
Vaughan, 1964; Williams & Morland, 1976). Investigating this trend in the
development of ethnic attitudes using an adjective attribution task, Doyle, Beaudet, and
Aboud (1988), Powlishta, Serbin, Doyle, and White (1994) and Doyle and Aboud
(1995) found that, at the age of 5 or 6, children attribute mainly positive adjectives to
members of their own ethnic group, and mainly negative adjectives to members of other
ethnic groups. Between 6 and 12 years of age, this polarisation in the attribution of
adjectives decreases, as children gradually come to attribute both positive and negative
attributes to both the ethnic ingroup and outgroups. Barrett, Wilson, and Lyons (1999a)
report a similar developmental trend in children’s attributions to national groups. They

4
asked 5-11-year-old English children to attribute adjectives to their own national group
and to Americans and Germans. With increasing age, there was an increase in the
number of negative adjectives attributed to English people, and an increase in the
number of positive adjectives attributed to Americans and Germans. The net result was
an overall reduction in the positive bias towards the ingroup across this age range.
However, ingroup favouritism was still exhibited by the children at all ages.
Doyle et al. (1988) argue that the developmental changes which occur to ethnic
attitudes across middle childhood are due to the increasing recognition across this age
range that all ethnic groups contain all kinds of people exhibiting both positive and
negative characteristics. Doyle and Aboud (1995) further argue that this shift in the
conceptualisation of ethnic groups is itself based upon underlying socio-cognitive
changes in the way that large-scale social groups are conceptualised, involving
perceptions of greater variability within social groups and greater similarity between
social groups. Barrett et al.’s (1999a) finding that a similar developmental trend occurs
in children’s attributions to national groups is consistent with this hypothesis that the
reduction in ingroup bias during middle childhood is a consequence of a general
cognitive-developmental shift in children’s understanding of large-scale social groups.
In the present study, 6- to 15-year-old Basque children were asked to attribute
adjectives to their own national ingroup and to a number of national outgroups. One of the
aims of the study was to explore whether these children also exhibit an increase in
positivity towards national outgroups, and an increase in negativity towards their own
national ingroup, between the ages of 6 and 12. If such trends in the development of
intergroup attitudes are exhibited by this (hitherto unstudied) group of children, and in
relation to national rather than ethnic groups, this would bolster confidence in the claim
that changes in national attitudes across this age range are a consequence of a general
cognitive-developmental change which is applied contemporaneously to all large-scale
social groups (and not just ethnic groups).
However, in addition, and unlike the previous studies by Doyle et al. (1988),
Powlishta et al. (1994), Doyle and Aboud (1995), and Barrett et al. (1999a), the present
study also measured the strength of identification with the ingroup. Previous research
with both adults and children has revealed that attitudes to ingroups and outgroups can
be a product of many different factors, including the strength of subjective
identification with the ingroup, the individual’s beliefs about the nature of the
prevailing group boundaries, and about the relative status of the ingroup (e.g. see
Bennett & Sani, in press). The present study explored the particular suggestion that
attitudes to ingroups and outgroups are a product of the strength of subjective
identification with the ingroup.
The underlying argument here, originally derived from Social Identity Theory
(SIT) (Tajfel, 1978; Tajfel & Turner, 1986), is based upon the observation that
individuals belong to many different social groups (e.g. gender, national, ethnic, social
class, etc.) and that these social group memberships may sometimes be internalised as
part of an individual’s self-concept. SIT postulates that when this occurs, individuals
strive to obtain a sense of positive self-worth from their membership of the ingroup.
Consequently, in constructing representations of the ingroup and relevant outgroups,
dimensions of comparison are chosen which produce more favourable representations
of the ingroup than of outgroups, resulting in ingroup favouritism or outgroup
denigration or both. The positive distinctiveness which is attributed to the ingroup
produces positive self-esteem. However, in order for these effects to occur, the

5
individual needs to have internalised a social group membership as part of his or her
self-concept, that is, the individual must subjectively identify with that category. If an
individual’s subjective identification with a particular social group is weak or absent,
then these effects will not occur. The prediction that there should be a correlation
between the strength of identification and attitudes to the ingroup and outgroups has
been investigated extensively in relationship to adults (see, for example, Abrams, 1990;
Aharpour & Brown, 2000; Branscombe & Wann, 1994; Grant, 1992, 1993; Hinkle &
Brown, 1990; Kelly, 1988; Mummendey, Klink & Brown, 2001; Perreault & Bourhis,
1998), but rarely in relationship to children. Consequently, the present investigation
measured the strength of national identification in the children who were studied, in
order to ascertain whether this variable was related to the positive distinctiveness
attributed to the ingroup over the outgroups.
The study was conducted with children who are growing up in the Basque
Country, a part of which is located in the Spanish State. The Basque Country provides a
particularly interesting context in which to explore these issues. This is because
national identity is constructed in very different ways by different individuals living in
this country. The Basque language (which is also called Euskara) is one of the oldest
languages in Europe, but its use was forbidden for 40 years (during the years of the Franco
regime), when Spanish was the only official language which could be spoken in the Basque
Country. Because of immigration from some regions of Spain, Basque is today spoken only
by about 29% of the population of the Basque Country. The Basque Country itself is
divided between the French and the Spanish States. That part of the country which is
located in the Spanish State has a strong nationalist movement, and a strong social
perception of being different from the other parts of the Spanish State. However, this
perception is not homogeneous for a number of reasons, one of the most important being
that a large proportion of the population of the Basque Country immigrated from some parts
of the Spanish State, mainlyfrom Extremadura. During Franco’s regime, all Basque
institutions as well as the use of the language and Basque symbols were forbidden. When
Franco died, the Basque Countryachieved a certain level of autonomy. However, the right
to self-determination, one of the most salient principles for a large part of the population,
was not granted by the Spanish government. Thus many Basque individuals are concerned
to defend the Basque Country’s cultural and linguistic identity.
Sociolinguistic studies have revealed that the use of language by adults in the
Basque Country is related to their sense of national identification: adults who regularly
use the Basque language in their everyday interactions tend to exhibit a strong positive
identification with the Basque identity and an absence of identification with the Spanish
identity, while those who use the Spanish language instead tend to exhibit a low level
of identification with the Basque identity and a strong positive identification with the
Spanish identity (Azurmendi, Garcia & Gonzalez, 1998; Elejabarrieta, 1994; Valencia
et al., in press). These findings are consistent with the findings of other studies which
have shown that there is often a close relationship between the use of language and the
formation of differentiated identity groups, and that different identity groups exhibit
different linguistic attitudes (Barrett et al., 1999b; Giles, Bourhis & Taylor, 1977;
Sachdev & Bourhis, 1990; Vila, 1996). Because of the availability of the two languages
(i.e. Spanish and Basque) in the Basque Country, which are themselves linked to different
patterns of national identification amongst adults, the present study aimed to examine
whether the national identifications which are acquired by children who are growing up in
the Basque County also vary as a function of the language(s) which are spoken with the

6
parents in the family home.
There are three possible situations which may pertain in the family home: parents
may speak only Spanish, only Basque, or both Spanish and Basque with their children.
Because parents’ choice of language is itself likely to be linked to the parents’ own
national identifications, the prediction is that children who are brought up by their
parents speaking only Spanish, only Basque, or both Spanish and Basque within the
home are themselves likely to acquire different patterns of national identification
(through their exposure to, and internalisation of, different patterns of national attitudes,
discourse and practices from their parents).
It was therefore predicted that there would be systematic variation in the
national identifications exhibited by the children in this study, as a function of the
language(s) spoken with the parents in the home environment. In one sense, this
prediction was trivial (being equivalent to the prediction that children growing up in
different national contexts will acquire different patterns of national identification).
However, precisely because it was expected that there would be such variability in the
national identifications exhibited by these children, it was reasoned that these data
would provide a particularly useful test of the robustness of both the cognitive-
developmental prediction (that there would be a reduction in ingroup bias through
middle childhood) and the social-identity prediction (that there would be a significant
correlation between the strength of national identification and the positive
distinctiveness ascribed to the ingroup). If these two predictions were to be upheld,
despite the variability in the specific contents of the national identification systems
being acquired by the children, it was reasoned that these effects must be especially
robust.
Method
Sample
The participants were 246 children aged 6, 9, 12 and 15 years old living in the
Basque Country (there were approximately the same number of children at each age: 63, 63,
62 and 58 children, respectively). 103 children were male, and 143 were female. The
linguistic home situation was assessed by asking the child what language(s) he/she used
to talk with his/her parents at home. Depending upon the answer, participants were
categorised into three linguistic subgroups. These three subgroups were: (a) a Spanish
group, which consisted of children who spoke only Spanish at home (N = 97); (b) a
Basque group, which consisted of children who spoke only Basque at home (N = 87);
and (c) a “bilingual” group, which consisted of children who spoke both Spanish and
Basque at home (N = 62).
Procedure
Each child was interviewed individually in a quiet room made available in their
school. The language in which the interview was conducted (Spanish or Basque) was
the language which the child used spontaneously to speak to the interviewer at their
initial meeting. After establishing rapport with the child, it was explained that the
interviewer was interested in finding out what the child thought about certain things.
Reassurance was given that this was not a test, that there were no right or wrong
answers, and that no one other than the interviewer would know what they had said.
The tasks which the children were given required the selection and organising of words,
which were printed on cards. The interviewer was alert to possible weaknesses in the

7
children’s reading skills and assistance in reading the cards was provided whenever this
was judged to be necessary. The children completed all the tasks in the same order.
Due to fact that Spanish (but not Basque) has feminine and masculine adjective
suffixes, three versions of the interview schedule and sets of response cards were
prepared in advance, two in Spanish (one in each gender) and one in Basque. Just one
of these interview schedules and set of response cards was used with each individual
child, depending on language (i.e. Basque or Spanish) and gender (i.e. male or female,
if the Spanish cards were used). The interview schedule and response cards were
initially prepared in English. They were then translated into Spanish and Basque
independently by two separate translators. The two translations were compared, and any
discrepancies resolved by discussion. The agreed instrument was then backtranslated
into English by a third independent translator, and the backtranslation was compared
with the original English instrument in order to ensure that no alterations in meaning
had occurred as a result of the translation process.
During the course of the interview, the following variables were measured.
Self-categorisations
The children’s self-categorisations were measured using two different methods. In
the first method, a set of 15 cards was presented to the child. These cards contained the
following descriptive terms: 6 years old, 9 years old, 12 years old, 15 years old, girl, boy,
city identity (i.e. the name for the people who live in the city or town in which the child
lived), Basque, Extremadurian, Spanish, European, English, French, Italian and German.
The interviewer spread these cards out randomly on the table and said to the child: Look
at these cards. All these words can be used to describe people. Which ones do you think
could be used to describe you? You can choose as many as you like. Shall I help you to
read them? After the child had selected the cards that she/he thought described
herself/himself, the interviewer put away the rejected cards and spread out the ones which
had been selected by the child on the table in a random order. The child was then asked:
So all these cards describe you. But if you had to choose only one of these cards because
it was the most important for you, which one would you choose? The chosen card was
removed from the set, and the child was then asked to choose the most important card out
of those remaining. This procedure was repeated until a rank order of importance had
been determined for all of the selected cards.
The second method which was used to measure the children’s self-categorisations
was the following open-ended question: If you were in America and someone asked you
“where are you from?”, what would you say? The children’s answers were recorded
verbatim.
National identifications
The children’s national identifications were measured using three sets of cards.
The first set of four cards concerned Spanish identification. The cards contained the
following text: very Spanish, a little bit Spanish, not at all Spanish, don’t know. The
cards were spread out in front of the child, with the left-right ordering of the first three
cards counterbalanced across successive children. The child was then asked: Which one
of these cards do you think best describes you? The child’s choice was recorded. The
second set of four cards concerned Basque identification and contained the following text:
very Basque, a little bit Basque, not at all Basque, don’t know. The same procedure was
used as in the case of the Spanish identification cards, with the children again being asked

8
to select the card which best described them. The third set of six cards contained the
following text: Basque, more Basque than Spanish, both Basque and Spanish, more
Spanish than Basque, Spanish, don’t know. Here, the left-right ordering of the first five
cards was counterbalanced across successive children. Once again, the child was asked
to choose the card which they thought best described them.
Evaluations of, and feelings about, the members of the national ingroup and selected
national outgroups
Two methods were used to assess the children’s evaluations of, and feelings
about, national ingroups and outgroups. The first method elicited the children’s
descriptions of seven specific groups: Basque, Extremadurian, Spanish, French, Italian,
British and German people (Extremadurian was included here as it is a salient outgroup
for many Basque people). The children were first presented with a set of 12 cards, each
of which contained one of the following terms: clean, dirty, friendly, unfriendly, clever,
stupid, hardworking, lazy, happy, sad, honest and dishonest. These particular terms
were chosen on the basis of previous studies which have shown that these are all terms
which children themselves produce spontaneously when asked to describe national and
ethnic groups, they are terms which children are able to comprehend in reference to
national and ethnic groups, and the dimensions which they capture are of known
relevance to children’s descriptions of national and ethnic groups (Barrett & Short,
1992; Doyle et al., 1988; Lambert & Klineberg, 1967). The cards were presented in a
different randomised order to each child. The child was then asked: Here are some
cards with words on them that can be used to describe people. So, we can say that some
people are ... (word written on first card; first card then removed and second one shown
to child). And some people are ... (word written on second card). Right? Now, what I
want you to do is go through all these words one by one, and I want you to sort out
those words which you think can be used to describe X people. Can you do that for me
please? Sort out the words which you think describe X people. The child was asked to
perform this task seven times, once in relationship to each of the seven national groups.
The national groups were administered in a different randomised order for each individual
child. It should be noted that this method allows the child to reject any positive or
negative adjective which he or she believes to be inapplicable to a particular target
group, and allows the child to assign adjectives independently to ingroups and to
outgroups. Thus, this method does not confound the measurement of ingroup bias and
outgroup rejection, unlike various other methods which have been used in the past to
measure children’s intergroup attitudes (cf. the discussion by Cameron, Alvarez, Ruble
& Fuligni, 2001).
The second method which was used was the following. Immediately after
completing the adjective sorting task for a particular national group, and before moving
on to the next national group, the child was asked: Now, I just want to ask you one more
thing about X people. Do you like or dislike X people? If the child said that he/she liked or
disliked the group, the interviewer then spread out on the table a set of cards containing
the words: dislike a lot, dislike a little, don’t know, like a little, like a lot. The child was
then asked: And how much do you like/dislike them? Choose your answer from these
cards. The procedure was repeated for each of the seven national groups.

9
Results
Self-categorisations
The first-choice self-descriptions that were chosen as the most important by the
children on the initial task measuring self-categorisation are shown in Table 1, broken
down according to linguistic group. In order to ascertain whether there was an
association between the children’s first choices on this task and either their linguistic
group or their age, a hierarchical log linear analysis was conducted. This revealed no
significant associations involving age, but a significant association between response
and linguistic group (2(10) = 38.61, p< 0.001). Children belonging to the Basque and
bilingual groups selected Basque as their first-choice identity more frequently than
children belonging to the Spanish group. The Spanish identity was chosen first only by a
relatively small proportion of the Spanish speakers, and this category was not chosen
first by any members of the other two linguistic groups. The European category was not
selected as their first choice by many participants in any of the linguistic groups.
Gender was clearly an important category for all three groups.
INSERT TABLES 1 AND 2 ABOUT HERE
The second method which was used to measure self-categorisation was by
means of the children’s answers to the question If you were in America and someone
asked you “where are you from?”, what would you say? A hierarchical log linear
analysis revealed an association between response and linguistic group (2(10) = 17.77,
p< 0.06), and between response and age (2(15) = 123.00, p< 0.0001). The data relating
to the association between response and linguistic group are shown in Table 2. The
Spanish speakers were less likely to respond with Basque Country than the Basque
speakers and the bilinguals, and were instead more likely than the other two groups to
respond with Spain.
The association between response and age group was due to a decline with age
in the frequency of mentions of the city (from 88.9% of responses at 6 years of age to
12.1% of responses at 15 years of age), an increase with age in the frequency of
mentions of the Basque Country (from 3.2% at 6 years to 57% at 15 years), and an
increase with age in the frequency of mentions of Spain (from 6.3% at 6 years to 27.6%
at 15 years). The 3-way association between linguistic group, age and response was not
significant.
National identifications
Spanish identification
A hierarchical log linear analysis revealed highly significant associations between
response and linguistic group (2(8) = 42.94, p< 0.0001) and between response and age
(2(12) = 63.42, p < 0.0001) on the Spanish identification task. The data are shown in
Table 3. As far as the relationship between linguistic home situation and Spanish
identification was concerned, while the not at all Spanish answer was chosen by a large
proportion of the Basque speakers and bilinguals, the Spanish-speaking group were more
likely to choose the very Spanish response.
INSERT TABLE 3 ABOUT HERE
The association with age was due to the frequency of don’t know answers
declining as a function of age from 41.3% of answers amongst the 6-year-olds to 5.2% of
answers amongst the 15-year-olds, the frequency of not at all Spanish responses
increasing with age from 12.7% amongst the 6-year-olds to 34.5% amongst the 15-year-

10
olds, and the frequency of a little bit Spanish responses increasing with age from 17.5%
amongst the 6-year-olds to 50.0% amongst the 15-year-olds. Once again, the 3-way
association between linguistic group, age and response was not significant.
Basque identification
A hierarchical log linear analysis of the responses on the Basque identification
task also revealed highly significant associations between response and linguistic group
(2(6) = 53.57, p< 0.0001) and between response and age (2(9) = 33.09, p< 0.0001).
The data are shown in Table 4. As far as the relationship between linguistic home
situation and Basque identification was concerned, although very Basque was chosen the
most frequently by all three linguistic groups, there were differences between the three
groups. In both the Basque and the bilingual groups, this was by far the most frequent
response (85.1% and 74.8% respectively), whereas this response was only chosen by the
Spanish group 43.3% of the time. In addition, 14.4% of the Spanish speakers chose not at
all Basque, whereas a much lower percentage of children in the Basque and bilingual
groups chose this answer.
INSERT TABLE 4 ABOUT HERE
The association with age was due to the frequency of don’t know answers
declining as a function of age from 15.9% of answers amongst the 6-year-olds to 1.7% of
answers amongst the 15-year-olds, and the frequency of a little bit Basque responses
increasing with age from 6.3% amongst the 6-year-olds to 22.4% amongst the 15-year-
olds. Again, the 3-way association between linguistic group, age and response was not
significant.
Spanish vs. Basque identification
The hierarchical log linear analysis of the responses on the Spanish vs. Basque
identification task revealed only a highly significant association between response and
linguistic group (2(10) = 58.55, p< 0.0001). There were no associations involving age
on this task. The data are presented in Table 5. Basque was the most common answer in
both the Basque and the bilingual groups (65.5% and 46.8% respectively), followed by
more Basque than Spanish for both groups. In the Spanish group, the most frequently
chosen card was both Basque and Spanish, followed by more Spanish than Basque.
INSERT TABLE 5 ABOUT HERE
Evaluations of the national ingroup and selected
national outgroups
The children’s attributions of adjectives to the seven national groups (Basque,
Extremadurian, Spanish, French, Italian, British and German) were analysed in the
following way. The 12 adjectives were first categorised on the following dimensions:
clean (clean/dirty), friendly (friendly/unfriendly), clever (clever/stupid), work
(hardworking/lazy), happy (happy/sad) and honest (honest/dishonest). The child’s
answers for each individual national group were then scored as follows: if the child chose
neither adjective of a dimension to describe the group, a score of 0 was awarded; if the
child chose only the negative adjective to describe the group, a score of 1 was awarded; if
the child chose both the negative and the positive adjectives of a dimension to describe
the group, a score of 2 was awarded; if the child chose only the positive adjective to
describe the group, a score of 3 was awarded. These scores were then summed, and
divided by the total number of dimensions which had been used by the child to evaluate

11
that particular group. This scoring procedure therefore yielded an evaluation score for
each individual target group on a scale which ranged from 1 to 3. The higher the
evaluation score, the more positively that group was evaluated on those particular
dimensions which had been chosen and used by the child to describe the group.
The evaluation scores for the seven national groups were analysed using a
principal components factor analysis with oblimin rotation. This revealed two factors: the
first factor included the evaluations of French, Extremadurian, German, Spanish, Italian
and British people (eigenvalue = 2.68; % of variance explained = 38.3%; factor
loadings = 0.63 and above), while the second factor consisted of the evaluations only of
Basque people (eigenvalue = 1.07; % of variance explained = 15.2%; factor loading =
0.92). These factors were called N-BAS (for non-Basque) and BAS (for Basque)
respectively.
The six scores forming the N-BAS factor scaled reliably (Cronbach’s alpha =
0.75), and so a single mean evaluation score was derived by averaging these six scores.
In order to ascertain whether there were any significant differences in the BAS and N-
BAS scores as a function of either linguistic group or age, a 4 (age) x 3 (linguistic
group) x 2 (BAS vs. N-BAS) mixed analysis of variance was carried out, with
independent groups on the first two factors and repeated measures on the third factor.
There were no significant effects involving age. However, there was a significant main
effect of BAS vs. N-BAS (F(1, 197) = 175.50, p< 0.001). The mean scores are shown
in Table 6, which reveals that the BAS scores were consistently higher than the N-BAS
scores in all three linguistic groups. There was also a significant main effect of
linguistic group (F(2, 197) = 3.75, p< 0.05), but this was qualified by a significant
interaction between linguistic group and BAS vs. N-BAS (F(2, 197) = 17.07, p< 0.001).
Post hoc Scheffe tests (p< 0.05) were used to explore these effects involving linguistic
group. These revealed that the N-BAS scores produced by the Basque speakers were
significantly lower than the N-BAS scores produced by the Spanish speakers and the
bilinguals, while the BAS scores produced by the Basque speakers were significantly
higher than the BAS scores produced by the Spanish speakers. Thus, the use of Spanish
in the home (by both Spanish speakers and bilinguals) is associated with more positive
N-BAS evaluations, while the exclusive use of Basque in the home is associated with
more positive BAS evaluations (compared with speakers who exclusively use Spanish
in the home).
INSERT TABLE 6 ABOUT HERE
The numbers of positive and negative adjectives attributed to
the seven national groups
In order to examine the specific cognitive-developmental prediction that the
number of negative adjectives attributed to the national ingroup, and the number of
positive adjectives attributed to national outgroups, would increase between 6 and 12
years of age, seven additional ANOVAs were conducted on the adjectives. In these
analyses, the number of positive and negative adjectives which had been attributed to
each of the seven national groups individually were analysed using seven separate 4 (age)
x 3 (linguistic group) x 2 (positive vs. negative adjectives) mixed ANOVAs. There were
no significant main effects of age, and no significant interaction effects involving age, in
any of these analyses. In other words, the number of positive and negative adjectives
attributed to each individual national group showed no changes as a function of age,
contrary to prediction.

12
Feelings about the national ingroup and selected
national outgroups
The children’s responses to the questions concerning whether they liked or
disliked the members of each national group were scored in the following way: dislike a
lot = 1, dislike a little = 2, don’t know = 3, like a little = 4, like a lot = 5. The scores for
the seven national groups were analysed using a principal components factor analysis
with oblimin rotation. The factor analysis revealed two factors. The first factor included
feelings towards German, French, Italian, Extremadurian and British people
(eigenvalue = 2.27; % of variance explained = 32.5%; factor loadings = 0.55 and
above). The second factor included Basque people (positive loading) and Spanish
people (negative loading) (eigenvalue = 1.17; % of variance explained = 16.7%; factor
loading for Basque = 0.84, factor loading for Spanish = - 0.59). These two factors were
called Affect towards other European people and Affect toward Basque vs. Spanish
people respectively.
The five scores which loaded onto the Affect towards other European people
factor scaled reliably (Cronbach’s alpha = 0.64), and so a single mean affect score was
derived by averaging these five scores. Because the Spanish affect scores were
negatively loaded onto the second factor, they were reverse scored, and a mean score
for the Affect toward Basque vs. Spanish people factor was then derived by averaging
these reversed Spanish affect scores with the Basque affect scores.
In order to ascertain whether there were any significant differences in the two
Affect scores as a function of either linguistic group or age, a 4 (age) x 3 (linguistic
group) x 2 (Affect towards other European people vs. Affect towards Basque vs.
Spanish people) mixed analysis of variance was carried out, with independent groups
on the first two factors and repeated measures on the third factor. This revealed a
significant main effect of age (F(3, 217) = 5.52, p< 0.001). Exploration of this main
effect using post hoc Scheffe tests (p< 0.05) revealed that it was due to the nine-year-
old children exhibiting significantly less positive affect than the fifteen-year-olds
(overall mean affect for nine-year-olds = 3.14 (SD = 0.57), overall mean affect for
fifteen-year-olds = 3.55 (SD = 0.43)). This finding is curious, and difficult to explain.
There were no other significant differences or effects involving age. However, there
was a significant main effect of linguistic group (F(2, 217) = 3.95, p< 0.05), but this
was qualified by a significant interaction between linguistic group and Affect towards
other European people vs. Affect towards Basque vs. Spanish people (F(2, 217) =
20.73, p< 0.001). The means are shown in Table 7.
INSERT TABLE 7 ABOUT HERE
Post hoc Scheffe tests (p< 0.05) were used to explore these effects involving
linguistic group. These tests revealed that the Basque speakers exhibited significantly
lower affect towards other European people than the Spanish speakers and the
bilinguals, and that the Spanish speakers exhibited significantly lower affect towards
Basque people (and higher affect towards Spanish people) than the Basque speakers
and the bilinguals. Thus, the use of Spanish as a family language (by both Spanish
speakers and by bilinguals) is related to more positive affect towards other European
peoples, while the use of Basque as a family language (by both Basque speakers and
bilinguals) is associated with more positive affect towards Basque people (and lower
affect towards Spanish people).

13
The relationship between strength of national identification and
positive distinctiveness
SIT postulates that when an individual identifies strongly with a particular
social group, he or she is motivated to evaluate that group positively in comparison to
salient outgroups, using appropriate dimensions of comparison in order to do so. Thus,
the strength of identification with the national group should be related to the degree of
positive distinctiveness which is attributed to that group vis-à-vis other national
outgroups: the stronger the identification, the greater the level of positive
distinctiveness attributed to the ingroup. This prediction was tested in the following
way.
Firstly, the adjective evaluation scores which were obtained for the French,
Extremadurian, German, Italian and British outgroups were subtracted from the
adjective evaluation scores for the Basque group, producing five positive
distinctiveness scores for the Basque group. These five scores were analysed using a
principal components factor analysis with oblimin rotation, which revealed that they all
loaded on to a single factor (eigenvalue = 2.80; % of variance explained = 55.9%) on
which all variables loaded at 0.72 or above. As the five variables scaled reliably
(Cronbach’s alpha = 0.80), a mean Basque positive distinctiveness score was derived.
Next, this positive distinctiveness score was correlated with the strength of
Basque identification. This correlation was run only on those children who had
spontaneously selected the Basque card as a self-description in the first self-
categorisation task (to ensure that only data from individuals who subjectively
identified with this category as an ingroup were included in the correlation). The
correlation between the strength of Basque identification and Basque positive
distinctiveness was significant (r= 0.19, p < 0.05; with age partialled out, r= 0.17, p <
0.05).
Secondly, the adjective evaluation scores which were obtained for the French,
German, Italian and British outgroups were subtracted from the adjective evaluation
scores for the Spanish group, producing four positive distinctiveness scores for the
Spanish group (Extremadurian was not used as a comparison group in this case, as it is
a sub-group of the Spanish group). These four scores were analysed using a principal
components factor analysis with oblimin rotation, which revealed that they all loaded
on to a single factor (eigenvalue = 2.53; % of variance explained = 63.2%) on which all
variables loaded at 0.79 or above. As the four variables scaled reliably (Cronbach’s
alpha = 0.81), a mean Spanish positive distinctiveness score was derived.
Using only the data from that group of children who had spontaneously selected
the Spanish card as a self-description in the first self-categorisation task, it was found
that the Spanish positive distinctiveness score was significantly and positively
correlated with the strength of Spanish identification (r= 0.35, p < 0.001; with age
partialled out, r= 0.32, p< 0.001). Thus, in the case of both Basque and Spanish
identification, there was support for the SIT prediction that the strength of identification
is related to the positive distinctiveness attributed to the ingroup.
The relationship between strength of national identification and
affective distinctiveness
Analogous analyses were conducted on the affect (like/dislike) scores. Firstly,
the affect scores which were obtained for the French, Extremadurian, German, Italian
and British outgroups were subtracted from the affect scores for the Basque group,

14
producing five affective distinctiveness scores for the Basque group. These five scores
were analysed using a principal components factor analysis with oblimin rotation,
which revealed that they all loaded on to a single factor (eigenvalue = 2.97; % of
variance explained = 59.3%) on which all variables loaded at 0.75 or above. As the five
variables scaled reliably (Cronbach’s alpha = 0.83), a mean Basque affective
distinctiveness score was derived. Using only the data from that group of children who
had spontaneously selected the Basque card as a self-description in the first self-
categorisation task, it was found that this affective distinctiveness score was
significantly and positively correlated with the strength of Basque identification (r=
0.30, p< 0.001; with age partialled out, r= 0.29, p< 0.001).
Secondly, the affect scores which were obtained for the French, German, Italian
and British outgroups were subtracted from the affect scores for the Spanish group,
producing four affective distinctiveness scores for the Spanish group. These four scores
were analysed using a principal components factor analysis with oblimin rotation,
which revealed that they all loaded on to a single factor (eigenvalue = 2.81; % of
variance explained = 70.2%) on which all variables loaded at 0.81 or above. As these
four variables scaled reliably (Cronbach’s alpha = 0.86), a mean Spanish affective
distinctiveness score was derived. Using only the data from that group of children who
had spontaneously selected the Spanish card as a self-description in the first self-
categorisation task, it was found that this Spanish affective distinctiveness score was
significantly and positively correlated with the strength of Spanish identification (r=
0.45, p< 0.001; with age partialled out, r= 0.41, p< 0.001). Thus, in the case of both
Basque and Spanish identification, there was a significant and positive relationship
between the strength of identification and the affective distinctiveness exhibited
towards the ingroup.
Discussion
At the end of the Introduction, three predictions were outlined. It was predicted
that: (1) there would be systematic variability in the national identifications exhibited
by the children as a function of the language(s) spoken with the parents in the home
environment; (2) there would be a reduction in ingroup bias between 6 and 12 years of
age (the cognitive-developmental prediction); and (3) there would be a significant
correlation between the strength of national identification and the positive
distinctiveness ascribed to the ingroup (the social identity prediction). The findings will
be discussed in relationship to each of these three predictions in turn.
Variability in the national identifications exhibited by the children
The study revealed that there were indeed pervasive differences in the children’s
national identifications as a function of their linguistic group. To summarise the
findings first: the children who spoke only Spanish at home with their parents, when
compared with the Basque-speaking children, were less likely to choose Basque as their
first-choice self-description, were more likely to say that they came from Spain, were
more likely to say they felt very Spanish, were less likely to say they felt very Basque,
were more likely to say they were both Basque and Spanish or more Spanish than
Basque, evaluated other national outgroups more positively, evaluated Basque people
less positively, exhibited less positive affect towards Basque people (and more positive
affect towards Spanish people), attributed lower positive and affective distinctiveness to
Basque people, and attributed higher positive and affective distinctiveness to Spanish

15
people.
By contrast, the children who spoke only Basque at home with their parents,
when compared with the Spanish-speaking children, were more likely to choose Basque
as their first-choice self-description, were more likely to say that they came from the
Basque Country, were more likely to say they were not at all Spanish, were more likely
to say they were very Basque, were more likely to say they were Basque rather than
Spanish, evaluated other national groups less positively, evaluated Basque people more
positively, exhibited less positive affect towards other national groups, exhibited more
positive affect towards Basque people (and less positive affect towards Spanish people),
attributed higher positive and affective distinctiveness to Basque people, and attributed
lower positive and affective distinctiveness to Spanish people.
The bilingual children showed an intermediate pattern of national identification,
sometimes resembling the Spanish group and sometimes resembling the Basque group.
The bilingual children tended to be more similar to the Basque children in terms of their
national identifications (see Tables 1-5), but more similar to the Spanish children in
terms of their evaluations of and feelings towards national outgroups (see Tables 6 and
7).
Thus the children exhibited different patterns of both national identifications
and national attitudes as a function of their linguistic group membership, presumably as
a consequence of their exposure to, and internalisation of, the different national
identifications and attitudes exhibited by their parents. A role for familial and/or socio-
environmental factors in the development of ethnic attitudes has recently been
hypothesised by Black-Gutman & Hickson (1996), Ocampo et al. (1997), and Cameron
et al. (2001), and the present findings suggest that such factors may indeed be important
in the development of national attitudes as well.
Note that in proposing this explanation of the observed differences between the
three linguistic groups, it is not being suggested that the mere circumstance of speaking
a particular language (or pair of languages) at home is itself the causal factor which
determines the pattern of national identification which is exhibited by the child. Instead,
the pattern of language use in the home is itself likely to be determined by the
ideological choices and the value systems of the parents in regard to issues of national
identification. Indeed, we would argue that language choice is used within the Basque
community as an instrument of intergroup differentiation, with adult speakers using
their choice of language as a tactical positioning tool which allows them to express
their attitudes towards the objective intergroup conflicts (i.e. between Basques and
Spaniards) existing within the context of the modern Spanish State (cf. Azurmendi et
al., 1998; Elejabarrieta, 1994; Valencia et al., in press; Vila, 1996). Thus, it seems
likely that parental national identifications, and parental linguistic tactical positionings
and practices, are the underlying factors that determine both the language(s) which are
spoken by their children in the home and the patterns of national identification which
are acquired by their children. However, in order to test this hypothesis, future studies
should assess parental identifications and attitudes in addition to their children’s, to
ascertain whether these factors do in fact make a larger contribution to their children’s
national identifications and attitudes than language use per se.
The cognitive-developmental prediction
On the basis of previous findings by Doyle et al. (1988), Powlishta et al. (1994),
Doyle and Aboud (1995) and Barrett et al. (1999a), it had also been predicted that there

16
would be a reduction in ingroup bias between 6 and 12 years of age. However, the
overall picture which emerged from this study is that the children at all four ages
exhibited remarkably similar patterns of response. It is especially noteworthy that the
study failed to find any age-related changes in the overall evaluations of the national
ingroup, in the overall evaluations of the national outgroups, in the affect expressed
towards the ingroup, in the affect expressed towards the outgroups, or in the number of
positive and negative adjectives attributed to ingroups and outgroups.
The findings of the present study therefore raise problems for the cognitive-
developmental account of the development of intergroup attitudes. Aboud and her
colleagues (Aboud, 1988; Doyle et al., 1988; Doyle & Aboud, 1995) have argued that
there are substantial changes in intergroup attitudes between 6 and 12 years of age.
They postulate that an important feature of these changes is that at 6 years of age
children tend to attribute mainly positive characteristics to members of their own
ingroup, and mainly negative characteristics to members of outgroups; by 12 years of
age children attribute a mixture of both positive and negative characteristics to both
ingroups and outgroups. Thus, the reduction in ingroup bias which has been observed in
previous studies to occur between 6 and 12 years of age is hypothesised to be due to a
decrease in the perceived homogeneity of both ingroups and outgroups, and the
increasing realisation with age that all social groups contain all kinds of people.
However, in the present study, these kinds of age-related changes in the attribution of
positive and negative characteristics in the adjective evaluation task did not occur. This
finding casts doubt upon the generalisability of Aboud’s explanation, and upon the
cognitive-developmental hypothesis that the reduction in ingroup bias through middle
childhood is due to an underlying cognitive shift in the way in which all large-scale
social groups are conceptualised.
In fact, the findings of this study cast some doubt upon any developmental
theory which presupposes that children’s national attitudes develop in a similar way
irrespective of the specific national context in which they are growing up. Such an
account fails to provide a satisfactory explanation of why children growing up in some
national contexts (e.g. England and Switzerland: Barrett et al., 1999a; Piaget & Weil,
1951; Tajfel, 1966) exhibit substantial age-related changes in national attitudes,
whereas children growing up in other national contexts (such as the Basque Country) do
not exhibit any such changes. The findings of the present study imply that universalist
accounts of the development of intergroup attitudes simply do not do justice to the
complexities of the actual developmental data, which instead reveal very different
patterns of development according to the specific national context involved (cf. the
similar conclusions reached by Black-Gutman & Hickson, 1996, and Ocampo, Knight
& Bernal, 1997, on the development of ethnic attitudes).
There were occasional differences which occurred in the children’s responses as
a function of age, but these tended to involve the children’s self-categorisations and
national identifications, rather than their intergroup attitudes. For example, the
children’s responses to the question If you were in America and someone asked you
“where are you from?”, what would you say? exhibited a significant association with
age. Essentially, the younger children were more likely to give the name of their city in
response to this question, while the older children were more likely to respond with
either the Basque Country or Spain. This association of response with age may be due
to the concrete local city environment being more salient to the younger children (cf.
Piaget & Weil, 1951), although it should be noted that very few children, even at the

17
youngest age, selected their city identity as their first-choice self-description (see Table
1). An alternative explanation is that as children get older they are more likely to draw
the inference that, because the initial premise of the question If you were in America
contains a term referring to a country, the interviewer requires them to produce a term
at an equivalent level of generality. By contrast, younger children may not be so attuned
to this tacit implication of the question, and are therefore more likely to produce
responses at other levels of generality, such as the name of their city.
Performance on both the Spanish and Basque identification tasks also showed
age-related differences, with the number of don’t know responses declining as a
function of age. This is perhaps not surprising when the sense of national identity is
only just beginning to emerge at 6 years of age. Such young children still clearly have
many uncertainties about their own national identity, a problem which may be
compounded in the Basque Country by the potential availability of both Basque and
Spanish as national categories.
The social identity prediction
SIT proposes that representations of ingroups and outgroups are cognitively
constructed by the individual in order to meet certain motivational needs, in particular
the need for positive self-esteem. Thus, in cases where the individual identifies strongly
with a particular social group, comparisons between that group and salient outgroups
are made by the individual using dimensions on which the ingroup receives the more
favourable judgements. This positive bias towards the ingroup, relative to the
comparison outgroups, enables the individual to achieve positive self-esteem as a
consequence of his or her membership of that more positively evaluated group.
However, when an individual’s subjective identification with the group is weak or
absent, then these effects will not occur. SIT therefore predicts a relationship between
the strength of ingroup identification and the degree of ingroup bias.
Consistent with this prediction, the present study found positive correlations
between the strength of Basque identification and the degree of both positive and
affective distinctiveness attributed to Basques, and between the strength of Spanish
identification and the degree of both positive and affective distinctiveness attributed to
Spaniards. Although these correlations were modest in size (ranging from 0.17 to 0.45),
they are comparable in magnitude to the correlations which have been found in similar
studies with adults (cf. Aharpour & Brown, 2000; Hinkle & Brown, 1990).
These correlations are particularly noteworthy given several features of the
present study. Firstly, the study examined the children’s judgements of five different
outgroups (i.e. Extremadurian, French, Italian, British and German people), rather than
just the one which has been used in many studies into children’s judgement of ethnic
groups (typically African American vs. European American). Secondly, the correlation
emerged using measures which do not confound the assessment of ingroup and
outgroup attitudes (cf. Cameron et al., 2001). Thirdly, the correlation was found in
relationship to two different national identifications (i.e. both Basque and Spanish
identification). Fourthly, the correlation was obtained on two different measures (i.e. a
descriptive-evaluative measure using adjectives and an affective like-dislike measure).
Fifthly, the correlation emerged despite the variability which occurred in the children’s
national identifications as a function of their linguistic group membership. Thus, this
correlation between the strength of national identification and the positive
distinctiveness attributed the national ingroup appears especially robust in the case of

18
Basque children.
Conclusions
This study has shown that national identification in Basque children is
associated with the language(s) spoken in the family home. It has also revealed that
Basque children’s evaluations of, and feelings towards, national ingroups and outgroups
are associated with the home linguistic situation. Thus, in the Basque Country, the use
of language is associated with different ways of thinking and feeling about national
groups and this relationship applies not only in adults but also in children. The
traditional cognitive-developmental account, which postulates that there is a reduction
in ingroup bias between 6 and 12 years of age, is unable to explain the lack of age-
related changes in attitudes towards national ingroups and outgroups that was found in
the present study. However, the study did yield evidence to support the prediction made
by social identity theory, namely that the strength of national identification would be
related to the positive distinctiveness ascribed to the national ingroup. The fact that this
prediction was supported using both an evaluative and an affect measure, with respect
to both Spanish and Basque identifications, and despite the variability in the national
identifications which occurred within the sample as a function of the language used in
the family home, suggests that this relationship is robust in these children.

19
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22
Table 1: The frequency with which each of six possible self-categorisations was chosen
as the most important, broken down by linguistic group.
SPANISH
SPEAKERS
BASQUE
SPEAKERS
BILINGUALS
AGE 17
(17.5%)
15
(17.2%)
9
(14.5%)
GENDER 43
(44.3%)
34
(39.1%)
21
(33.9%)
CITY 7
(7.2%)
3
(3.4%)
6
(9.7%)
BASQUE 14
(14.4%)
34
(39.1%)
25
(40.3%)
SPANISH 11
(11.3%)
0
(0%)
0
(0%)
EUROPEAN 5
(5.2%)
1
(1.1%)
1
(1.6%)

23
Table 2: The frequency of different responses to the question If you were in America
and someone asked you “where are you from?”, what would you say?, broken down by
linguistic group.
SPANISH
SPEAKERS
BASQUE
SPEAKERS
BILINGUALS
NAME OF CITY 44
(45.4%)
40
(46.0%)
26
(41.9%)
BASQUE
COUNTRY
21
(21.6%)
32
(36.8%)
25
(40.3%)
SPAIN 29
(29.9%)
11
(12.6%)
8
(12.9%)
EUROPE 2
(2.1%)
2
(2.3%)
1
(1.6%)
DON’T KNOW 0
(0%)
1
(1.1%)
0
(0%)
OTHER 1
(1.0%)
1
(1.1%)
2
(3.2%)

24
Table 3: The frequency with which each of the three possible levels of Spanish
identification was chosen, broken down by linguistic group.
SPANISH
SPEAKERS
BASQUE
SPEAKERS
BILINGUALS
NOT AT ALL
SPANISH
7
(7.2%)
29
(33.7%)
22
(36.1%)
A LITTLE BIT
SPANISH
37
(38.1%)
26
(30.2%)
22
(36.1%)
VERY SPANISH 36
(37.1%)
10
(11.6%)
10
(16.4%)
DON’T KNOW 17
(17.5%)
19
(22.1%)
7
(11.5%)
OTHER 0
(0%) 2
(2.3%)
0
(0%)

25
Table 4: The frequency with which each of the three possible levels of Basque
identification was chosen, broken down by linguistic group.
SPANISH
SPEAKERS
BASQUE
SPEAKERS
BILINGUALS
NOT AT ALL
BASQUE
14
(14.4%)
4
(4.6%)
2
(3.2%)
A LITTLE BIT
BASQUE
35
(36.1%)
2
(2.3%)
9
(14.5%)
VERY
BASQUE
42
(43.3%)
74
(85.1%)
46
(74.8%)
DON’T KNOW 6
(6.2%)
7
(8.0 %)
5
(8.1%)

26
Table 5: The frequency with which each of the five possible levels of Basque vs.
Spanish identification was chosen, broken down by linguistic group.
SPANISH
SPEAKERS
BASQUE
SPEAKERS
BILINGUALS
BASQUE 20
(20.6%)
57
(65.5%)
29
(46.8%)
MORE BASQUE
THAN SPANISH
18
(18.6%)
14
(16.1%)
17
(27.4%)
BOTH BASQUE
AND SPANISH
25
(25.8%)
5
(5.7%)
10
(16.1%)
MORE SPANISH
THAN BASQUE
21
(21.6%)
6
(6.9%)
1
(1.6%)
SPANISH 10
(10.3%)
3
(3.4%)
2
(3.2%)
DON’T KNOW 3
(3.1%)
2
(2.3%)
3
(4.8%)

27
Table 6: Mean scores (and standard deviations) on the N-BAS and BAS evaluation
factors.
Spanish speakers Basque speakers Bilinguals
FACTOR 1: N-BAS 2.48 (0.35) 2.11 (0.57) 12.43 (0.51)
FACTOR 2: BAS 2.79 (0.42) 2.93 (0.20) 22.86 (0.31)
1Significantly different from the N-BAS scores of the Spanish speakers and the bilinguals
2Significantly different from the BAS scores of the Spanish speakers

28
Table 7: Mean affect scores (and standard deviations) towards other European people
and towards Basque vs. Spanish people.
Spanish speakers Basque speakers Bilinguals
FACTOR 1: AFFECT
TOWARDS OTHER
EUROPEAN PEOPLE
3.46 (0.78) 2.99 (0.91) 13.39 (0.77)
FACTOR 2: AFFECT
TOWARDS BASQUE
VS. SPANISH PEOPLE
2.95 (0.90) 23.77 (0.85) 3.62 (0.83)
1Significantly different from the Affect towards other European people scores of the Spanish speakers
and the bilinguals
2Significantly different from the Affect towards Basque vs. Spanish people scores of the Basque speakers
and the bilinguals