Trans. Nat. Acad. Sci.

Techno/. I 5: 269-277.1 993

SOCIAL CATEGORIZATION AND IDENTITY IN THE

PHILIPPINES

MA CECILIA GASTAROO-CONACO
Department ofPsychology
University ofthe Philippines
Diliman, Quezon City

ABSTRACT

Using a social cognitive theoretical and methodological approach, this

research looks into the concept of social categorization, an assumed precondi­
tion for the development of social identity, within the Philippine context. The
study was conducted among students at the University of the Phil ippines in
Diliman, Quezon City. Three sets of questionnaires were administered to tap into
various social category perceptions. Results showed that national category mem­
bership is deemed important but is not nearly as salient as one's family, gender or
religious group memberships. Perceptions of own ethnic group were seen as more
positive than those for the national group and very little overlap in features was
noted between the two social categories. Data trends indicate a possible weakness
in our concept of national category membership which could provide the possible
underpinnings for earlier findings by other researchers on the tenuousness of
Philippine national identity.

INTRODUCTION

Bruner, Goodnow and Austin ( 1956) said that "to categorize is to render
discriminably different things equivalent, to group the objects and events and
people around us into classes, and to respond to them in terms of their class
membership rather than their uniqueness." By grouping objects and events to­
gether that, to our minds, have commonalities on certain dimensions, we are able to
think about and respond to them in familiar learned ways. Categorization thus
serves as an anchor in a complex and potentially overwhelming environment (Lingle,
Altom and Medin, 1984).
Nowhere is the value of categorization more apparent than in dealing with
our social world. Without categorization, every person and every social situation
would have to be processed as new, leaving the social perceiver confused and
overwhelmed by the volume of information that needs to be processed prior to
engaging in any action.

269
270 Transactions National Academy of Science

Tajfel ( 1 98 1 ) referred to social categorization as one of our tools for structuring

our envirorunent and establishing our own "construction of any particular social
reality." Many social processes arise from categorization. Among these are
stereotypes (Allport, 1954) and social identity (Tajfel, 1 981).
This study investigates social categorization among Filipinos focusing on
ethnic and national categories, their salience and use with the goal of understanding
better the underpinnings of national identity. It aims to look at the relevant social
categories identified and processed by the Filipino social perceiver, the place of
ethnic and national categories within this matrix and the relationship of the ethnic
to the national category.
There is no doubt that stereotypes and social identity particularly national
and ethnic identities, have their origins in history and culh1ral traditions related to
one's experiences within a particular socio-political context. Looking into these
origins has been the popular approach used by various Philippine researchers
(Constantino, 1 974; Corpuz, 1 990· Doronila, 1 989 1992) in analyzing the stunted
growth of our Filipino national identity.
The social cogtlitive theoretical and methodological framework is suggested
in tllis research as a dynamic alternative to standard approaches. Rather than
focusin� on historical and contextual antecedents, this approach would treat group
memberships and their dynamics as information to be processed and their social
outcomes as resultant by-products of such information processing.

MEIRODOI..OGY

Subjects

At the outset, this researcher was interested in obtaining a sample that would
give a fair distribution of the different eUmic groups in the country. Since a large
national sample was not possible for the research, it was decided to pilot the
research with the Social Science classes at the College of Social Sciences and
Philosophy of tl1e Univesity of the Philippines in Diliman. The Social Science courses
are general education courses required of all students at the university in their first
two years of college. It was thus reasonable to expect the students to be fairly
varied in their backgrounds. Three Social Science classes were approached with a
total of 106 respondents ultimately participating in the study.
The respondents' ages ranged from 16 to 26 years with 46.2% falling in the
18-ycar-old bracket. Majority (79.2%) were Catholics. More than half of the
respondents (65. 1 %) graduated from a private lligh school and only 34.9% came
from public high schools.
Majority (59.4%) of the respondents listed a home address situated in Metro
Manila with the rest listing provincial addresses from all over t11e country. Only
35.8% of the respondents, however, mentioned the National Capital Region as their
 Conaco: Social Categorization and Identity 271

region o f origin. The rest mentioned various regions all over the country, although
regions in Luzon (Central Luzon and Southern Tagalog) were over-represented
(1 3.2% and 15. 1%, respectively).
Respondents categorized themselves as belonging to different ethnic groups.
Table I shows the distribution of the self-ascribed ethnicity of the respondents It
should be noted that although Manileno is not, strictly speaking, an ethnic group,
a small percentage of the respondents gave that as their etlmic affi liation.
Parental ethnicity of the respondents was also varied. Approximately one­
third of the respondents (33.96%) had parents who came from different ethnic
groups. The rest had parents belonging to t11e same ethnic group.
Across the different ethnic groups, 65.09% claimed Tagalog or Pilipino as the
dominant language used. Of the remaining 34. 9 1 %, 1 3 . 2 1 % said their dominant
language was English. Thus, only a total of 2 1 .7% actually used the language of
the ethnic group they belonged to as a major means of conununication.
Questions about other languages used by the respondent showed that 22%
of those who did not mention Tagalog or Pilipino as their dominant language
mentioned it later as another language also used.

Procedure

Three questionnaires were administered at three-to four-week intervals to the

study participants. The sequence in questionnaire administration was randomly
varied with approximately one-third of the subjects receiving a different sequence
each. This was to rule out the influence of response set on subject's performance.
One questionnaire looked into the respondents' perceptions of being Filipino;
another looked into perceptions of one's ethnic group; and a third questionnaire
focused on social category memberships in general. Additional demographic data,
as well as data on parents' etlmicity, region of origin, limguages used at home and
religion, were also obtained. Data were analyzed using mainly descriptive statistics.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Social Categorization in the Philippines

The .first question of interest in the research was the matrix of social categories
in which both eUmic and national group memberships may be embedded. To tap
into group memberships viewed as relevant and important, respondents were simply
asked to list down all the social categories or groups which they felt they belonged
to and to rate each one in terms of it personal importance. Order of listing was
u ed as an indicator of category information accessibility and group salience.
The maximum number of social categories listed was l 3 with a mean of 7.58
groups mentioned. Among Ute mentioned categories, family, gender and religion, in
272 Transactions National Academy of Science

that order, were mentioned first by 91 .9% of the respondents. Family was particularly
salient with 27.4% mentioning it first. This finding is not smprising and is consistent
with previous research on the marked significance of the family to tl1e Filipino
(Doronila, 1989, 1992; Medina, 199 1 ; Torres, n.d.).
National group came in a poor fourth among the first mentions with only four
respondents mentioning it before all other groups named. Across mentions,
however, national group was identified as a relevant social category by 67.92% of
the respondents. It would appear then that nationality, though viewed as a relevant
social category, is not as salient (i.e., not the first tlting t11at come� to mind) as
apparently more basic group memberships.
How did the ethnicity-based social category fare? Many of those who criticize
the Filipino's lack of nationalist sentiment often blame heightened sense of region­
alism or strong sense of ethnicity as the social cognitive approach that would trace
to an overly salient and highly accessible ethnic category. Doronila ( 1989), citing
the literature on Pltilippine ethnic groups, reported that "ethnic boundaries have
not yet been transcended, for which reason it is also reported that Philippine society
remains primarily familistic and secondarily regionalistic in orientation."
Data collected showed that ethnicity was mentioned in second place, at tl1e
earliest, and this by only 2 out of 106 respondents. Taken all together, however,
ethnicity was mentioned as relevant by only 38.68% of the respondents. It appears
that more respondents were mindful of t11e national compared to the ethnic group
category. The mean salience rating (based on the category list position) for
nationality was 3 .24 compared to 2.68 for ethnicity. Though caution in interpreta­
tion is advised given the skewness of the sample, the results appear to be consist­
ent with a nationalist mind-shift tl1at Doronila ( 1 992) noted in her research.
Consistent with the data on category salience, the importance ratings given
to the national group were also higher compared to those for the ethnic group
(mean rating for nationality is 3 .08, whereas that for ethnicity is 2.68, given a 4-
point rating scale where 4 = very important).
Five types of respondents may be identified based on the category salience
data: ( l ) those who seem to find no relevance to either nationality or etlmicity as
evidenced by their failure to mention eitl1er national or ethnic social categories; (2)
those for whom ethnic group seems dominant, mentioning only this category but
not the national group· (3) those for whom ethnicity is primary but do not forget
the national group; ( 4) those who mention or consider the national group before
tltinking of tl1eir ethnicity; and (5) those who consider only the national group.
Further research should be done to look into the impact of these five cognitive sets
on the definition of national identity.
 Conaco: Social Categorization and Identity 273

Ethnic Versus National Group Perceptions

A second question of interest was the comparative assessment of ethnic and

national categories. This looked into the possible outcomes of category processing.
Aside from a listing and rating of relevant social categories, respondents were also
asked to list down 10 features and characteristics which they felt defined their own
etlmic group and the national group. The proportion of positive features to the
total mentioned was computed and used as an i ndicator of positivity of one's
perception toward that particular social category. Table 2 shows the proportion
means for each ethnic group.
The data show a clear trend of subjects favoring their own group over the
national group. The literature often refers to this as the in-group bias (Turner, 1 98 1 )
except that i n this case, both ethnic and national groups could be considered a s in­
groups. The greatest difference in positivity proportions is shown by the Mindanao
groups and the least difference is shown by the Chinese/mestizo group. Of particular
note is the raUJCr low means for own group perception among the Muslim and t11e
Chinese/mestizo groups compared to the other etimic groups.
A t-test for correlated means was done on tile overall means and the results
showed a significant difference between the proportion of positivity toward one's
ethnic group and the national group [! ( lOS] = -6.902, p < .0001 ], indicating that own
etlmic group is seen in a more positive light tJ1an the national group.
A relate� issue explored was the perceived relationship between own group
and the national group. To do this, the researcher reviewed each subject's feature
lists for own ethnic and national groups and counted the number of category
overlaps, mentioned features which were common to both groups (Table 3). In the
social cognitive literature, common and distinctive features between two categories
are used to represent si1nilarity relations (fversky, 1 977; Lingle et al., 1984).
Data trends follow the patterns of the positivity index with the Mindanao
groups showing the least similarity wiU1 the national group. It would appear that,
aside from seeing themselves in a more positive light, t11e Davao and Muslim
groups also perceive minimal similarity between themselves and the national group.
One may be tempted to hypot11esize cultural alienation. However, due to the .
limitations of the sample, care needs to be exercised in drawing any conclusions.
Further research is recommended to follow up on these questions.
What seems puzzling about the data configuration of pronounced disparity
between views about own group and the national group is its typicality for an in­
group/out-group relation. It is typical for members of the in-group to exhibit in­
group bias, a marked preference for one's own group, and out-group discrimination,
heightened negative perceptions of other groups (Turner, 198 1 ).
Ethnic and national groups, however, are not supposed to be in this type of
relationship pattern. One may even possibly conceive of a category hierarchy where
national group is the superordinate category encompassing ethnic group categori­
zations. Category overlaps are thus expected to be high and the valence of
274 Transac1ions Nmiona/ Academy of Science

perceptions relatively consistent. Further analysis of the social perceiver's category

structures could provide some answers but that is beyond the scope of this
particular study.

Social Category Features and Stereotypes

In addition to a rudimentary look at the structure of our respondents' social

categories, the content of their ethnic and national category schemata were also
explored. Three intriguing patterns were noted upon reviewing the content of the
respondents' stereotypes of the ethnic and national groups.
First, there were traits that were mentioned by almost all of the respondents
when describing the Filipino. These consensus traits included ho�-pitality, religiosity
and having close family ties. The regularity of their retrieval indicates t.he strength
of their association with our national group stereotype.
Second, tl1ere was also some degree of consensus regarding what t11e Filipino
is not. These features were being industrious, thrifty and modern.
However, it is in comparing etJmic stereotype content with tJ1e national group
stereotype that we see the extent of our ethnic group-centeredness. Own ethnic
group was usually described with positive traits like industrious/"masipag,"
hardworking, disciplined, thrifty, cooperative, helpful/"matulungin," cleall/'neat,
patien� practical, not traditional, not superstitious.
The opposite negative traits were attributed to the national group, however.
Thus the Filipino was described as lazy always late, undisciplined, extravagant/
showy, having a tal�mgka-mentality, traditional, superstitious, impractical, litterbug,
impatient.
Only the Ilocano group assigned themselves some negative traits - pessimistic
and stingy - while ascribing the opposite positive traits to the Filipino in general.
A good question to raise after seeing the data trends is why tl1e positivity of
ethnic perceptions does not generalize to national group perceptions. Given the
awareness majority of t11e respondents had of the _importance of being Filipino
(even beyond being a member of one's own ethnic group), one fails to see why
there is a denigration of such an important social category.
Tajfel (1981) posited that social categorization is often done in the service of
a need for positive social identity. If the group does not satisfy this requirement,
t11e individual can either quit being part of t11e group or, in the event such an
option is unavailable he may modify his interpretation of the group's unwelcome
features to make them more acceptable. Which option our respondents take would
make an interesting subject for fu1ther study.
 Co11aco: Social Categorization a11d lde11tity 275

CONCLUSIONS

In summary, three major findings are underscored. First, national and ethnic
groups are identified as relevant social categories but they are not as salient nor as
easily accessible as categories like family, gender or religious groups. Second,
being Filipino w-as more salient and rated as more important than being a member of
one's eUmic group. Third, despite the cognitive awareness of the importance of the
national category, category content was less positive compared to the ethnic group
category.
What are the implications of the findings? It would appear that, on the cogni­
tive level, we acknowledge our Filipino-ness and the importance of being a member
of tllis particular social category. Yet, it seems apparent that we have a less clear
picture of what the Filipino is and how being Filipino relates to our other social
identities. We see little overlap between our definition of our own group and the
Filipino.
On the affective level, we still favor our own group over the national group.
We ascribe more positive features to our ethnic group than we do to U1e Filipino
seemingly ignoring the fact tl1at one identity is subordinate to t11e other.
This research certainly raises more questions with its results than it had
i ntended to answer. Clearly, more research needs to be undertaken if we are to more
fully understand the Filipinos' processing of social categories and their social
identity.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

The support of the University of the Philippines tltrough a Diamond Jubilee

Faculty Grant and the U.P. Alum11i in Wisconsin Professorial Chair in Psychology
is gratefully acknowledged. The author also thanks Leo de Jesus, Joseph Puyat
and Aggie Legaspi for assistance with data collection and coding.
276 Transactions National Academy of Science

Table 1. Distribution of respondents' ethnicity (N = 106)

Percentage

Tagalog 41.51
Ilocano 13.21
Manileno 10.38
Bicolano 9.43
Cebuano Visayan 8.50
Chinese/mestizo 4.72
Ilonggo 4.72
Pampango 3.n
Davaoeno 2.83
Muslim .94

Table 2. Mean proportions of positivity of respondents' perception of ethnic

compared to national group

Ethnic National Difference

Ilocano .891 .669 .222

Tagalog .845 .713 . 132
Bicolano .915 .6n .238
Pampango .813 .750 .063
Manileno .715 .665 .050
Cebuano Visayan .819 .667 . 152
Davaoeno 1.000 .467 .533
Muslim .667 . 143 .524
Chinese/mestizo .61 1 .600 .Ol l
llonggo .800 .720 .080
Comb!ned gorups .830 .679 .151
 Conaco: Social Categorization and Identity 277

Table 3. Mean number of overlapping features for ethnic and national groups

Overlaps with National Category

Ilocano 2.357
Tagalog 3.227
Bicolano 2.400
Pampango 2.500
Manileno 2.455
Cebuano Visayan 3.444
Davaoeno 2.000
Muslim l .OOO
Chinese/mestizo 2.200
Ilonggo 2.800
Combined groups 2.821

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