Nostalgia: Past, Present, and Future

Traditionally, nostalgia has been conceptualized as a medical disease and a psychiatric disorder. Instead, we argue that nostalgia is a predominantly positive, self-relevant, and social emotion serving key psychological functions. Nostalgic narratives reflect more positive than negative affect, feature the self as the protagonist, and are embedded in a social context. Nostalgia is triggered by dysphoric states such as negative mood and loneliness. Finally, nostalgia generates positive affect, increases selfesteem, fosters social connectedness, and alleviates existential threat. KEYWORDS—nostalgia; positive affect; self-esteem; social connectedness; existential meaning The term nostalgia was inadvertedly inspired by history’s most famous itinerant. Emerging victoriously from the Trojan War, Odysseus set sail for his native island of Ithaca to reunite with his faithful wife, Penelope. For 3 years, our wandering hero fought monsters, assorted evildoers, and mischievous gods. For another 7 years, he took respite in the arms of the beautiful sea nymph Calypso. Possessively, she offered to make him immortal if he stayed with her on the island of Ogygia. ‘‘Full well I acknowledge,’’ Odysseus replied to his mistress, ‘‘prudent Penelope cannot compare with your stature or beauty, for she is only a mortal, and you are immortal and ageless. Nevertheless, it is she whom I daily desire and pine for. Therefore I long for my home and to see the day of returning’’ (Homer, 1921, Book V, pp. 78–79). This romantic declaration, along with other expressions of Odyssean longing in the eponymous Homeric epic, gave rise to the term nostalgia. It is a compound word, consisting of nostos (return) and algos (pain). Nostalgia, then, is literally the suffering due to relentless yearning for the homeland. The term nostalgia was coined in the 17th century by the Swiss physician Johaness Hofer (1688/1934), but references to the emotion it denotes can be found in Hippocrates, Caesar, and the Bible. HISTORICAL AND MODERN CONCEPTIONS OF NOSTALGIA From the outset, nostalgia was equated with homesickness. It was also considered a bad omen. In the 17th and 18th centuries, speculation about nostalgia was based on observations of Swiss mercenaries in the service of European monarchs. Nostalgia was regarded as a medical disease confined to the Swiss, a view that persisted through most of the 19th century. Symptoms— including bouts of weeping, irregular heartbeat, and anorexia— were attributed variously to demons inhabiting the middle brain, sharp differentiation in atmospheric pressure wreaking havoc in the brain, or the unremitting clanging of cowbells in the Swiss Alps, which damaged the eardrum and brain cells. By the beginning of the 20th century, nostalgia was regarded as a psychiatric disorder. Symptoms included anxiety, sadness, and insomnia. By the mid-20th century, psychodynamic approaches considered nostalgia a subconscious desire to return to an earlier life stage, and it was labeled as a repressive compulsive disorder. Soon thereafter, nostalgia was downgraded to a variant of depression, marked by loss and grief, though still equated with homesickness (for a historical review of nostalgia, see Sedikides, Wildschut, & Baden, 2004). By the late 20th century, there were compelling reasons for nostalgia and homesickness to finally part ways. Adult participants regard nostalgia as different from homesickness. For example, they associate the words warm, old times, childhood, and yearning more frequently with nostalgia than with homesickness (Davis, 1979). Furthermore, whereas homesickness research focused on the psychological problems (e.g., separation anxiety) that can arise when young people transition beyond the home environment, nostalgia transcends social groups and age. For example, nostalgia is found cross-culturally and among wellfunctioning adults, children, and dementia patients (Sedikides et al., 2004; Sedikides, Wildschut, Routledge, & Arndt, 2008; Zhou, Sedikides, Wildschut, & Gao, in press). Finally, although homesickness refers to one’s place of origin, nostalgia can refer Address correspondence to Constantine Sedikides, Center for Research on Self and Identity, School of Psychology, University of Southampton, Southampton SO17 1BJ, England, U.K.; e-mail: [email protected]. CURRENT DIRECTIONS IN PSYCHOLOGICAL SCIENCE 304 Volume 17—Number 5 Copyright r 2008 Association for Psychological Science to a variety of objects (e.g., persons, events, places; Wildschut, Sedikides, Arndt, & Routledge, 2006). It is in this light that we note the contemporary definition of nostalgia as a sentimental longing for one’s past. It is, moreover, a sentimentality that is pervasively experienced. Over 80% of British undergraduates reported experiencing nostalgia at least once a week (Wildschut et al., 2006). Given this apparent ubiquity, the time has come for an empirical foray into the content, causes, and functions of this emotion. THE EMPIRICAL BASIS FOR UNDERSTANDING NOSTALGIA The Canvas of Nostalgia What is the content of the nostalgic experience? Wildschut et al. (2006) analyzed the content of narratives submitted voluntarily by (American and Canadian) readers to the periodical Nostalgia. Also, Wildschut et al. asked British undergraduates to write a narrative account of a nostalgic experience. These narratives were also analyzed for content. Across both studies, the most frequently listed objects of nostalgic reverie were close others (family members, friends, partners), momentous events (birthdays, vacations), and settings (sunsets, lakes). Nostalgia has been conceptualized variously as a negative, ambivalent, or positive emotion (Sedikides et al., 2004). These conceptualizations were put to test. In a study by Wildschut, Stephan, Sedikides, Routledge, and Arndt (2008), British and American undergraduates wrote narratives about a ‘‘nostalgic event’’ (vs. an ‘‘ordinary event’’) in their lives and reflected briefly upon the event and how it made them feel. Content analysis revealed that the simultaneous expression of happiness and sadness was more common in narratives of nostalgic events than in narratives of ordinary events. Also in Wildschut et al., British undergraduates wrote about a nostalgic (vs. ordinary vs. simply positive) event in their lives and then rated their happiness and sadness. Although the recollection of ordinary and positive events rarely gave rise to both happiness and sadness, such coactivation occurred much more frequently following the recollection of a nostalgic event. Yet, nostalgic events featured more frequent expressions of happiness than of sadness and induced higher levels of happiness than of sadness. Wildschut et al. (2006) obtained additional evidence that nostalgia is mostly a positively toned emotion: The narratives included far more expressions of positive than negative affect. At the same time, though, there was evidence of bittersweetness. Many narratives contained descriptions of disappointments and losses, and some touched on such issues as separation and even the death of loved ones. Nevertheless, positive and negative elements were often juxtaposed to create redemption, a narrative pattern that progresses from a negative or undesirable state (e.g., suffering, pain, exclusion) to a positive or desirable state (e.g., acceptance, euphoria, triumph; McAdams, 2001). For example, although a family reunion started badly (e.g., an uncle insulting the protagonist), it nevertheless ended well (e.g., the family singing together after dinner). The strength of the redemption theme may explain why, despite the descriptions of sorrow, the overall affective signature of the nostalgic narratives was positive. Moreover, Wildschut et al. (2006) showed that nostalgia is a self-relevant and social emotion: The self almost invariably figured as the protagonist in the narratives and was almost always surrounded by close others. In all, the canvas of nostalgia is rich, reflecting themes of selfhood, sociality, loss, redemption, and ambivalent, yet mostly positive, affectivity. The Triggers of Nostalgia Wildschut et al. (2006) asked participants to describe when they become nostalgic. The most frequently reported trigger was negative affect (‘‘I think of nostalgic experiences when I am sad as they often make me feel better’’), and, within this category, loneliness was the most frequently reported discrete affective state (‘‘If I ever feel lonely or sad I tend to think of my friends or family who I haven’t seen in a long time’’). Given these initial reports, Wildschut et al. proceeded to test whether indeed negative mood and loneliness qualify as nostalgia triggers. British undergraduates read one of three news stories, each based on actual events, that were intended to influence their mood. In the negative-mood condition, they read about the Tsunami that struck coastal regions in Asia and Africa in December 2004. In the neutral-mood condition, they read about the January 2005 landing of the Huygens probe on Titan. In the positive-mood condition, they read about the November 2004 birth of a polar bear, ostensibly in the London Zoo (actually in the Detroit Zoo). Then they completed a measure of nostalgia, rating the extent to which they missed 18 aspects of their past (e.g., ‘‘holidays I went on,’’ ‘‘past TV shows, movies,’’ ‘‘someone I loved’’). Participants in the negativemood condition were more nostalgic (i.e., missed more aspects of their past) than were participants in the other two conditions. In another study, loneliness was successfully induced by giving participants false (high vs. low) feedback on a ‘‘loneliness’’ test (i.e., they were led to believe they were either lonely or not lonely based on the feedback). Subsequently, participants rated how much they missed 18 aspects of their past. Participants in the high-loneliness condition were more nostalgic than those in the low-loneliness condition. These findings were replicated among 9to 15-year-old Chinese children, Chinese undergraduates, and Chinese factory workers (Zhou et al., in press). Why might negative mood and loneliness trigger nostalgia? The psychological significance of nostalgia may reside in its capacity to counteract distress and restore psychological equanimity. But what are the pathways through which nostalgia exerts such palliative benefits? The Psychological Significance of Nostalgia Wildschut et al. (2006) randomly assigned British undergraduates to a nostalgia or ordinary-event condition. They induced Volume 17—Number 5 305 C. Sedikides et al.