The Characteristics of Chinese Psychological Needs and Their Correlations to Political Attitudes

Abstract

This paper answers the question, “What are the psychological needs for Chinese citizens that serve as motivations in forming and changing their political attitudes?” And more importantly, “What are the relationships between psychological needs and political attitudes?” I conducted several online surveys and find that Chinese citizens have strong social-adjustive (i.e. the need to fit into a social group) and ego-defensive (i.e. the need to preserve self-esteem) needs, whereas their value-expressive (i.e. the need to express core personal values) needs are less. The study also finds that social-adjustive needs were positively correlated to most pro-regime attitudes. However, citizens with stronger value-expressive needs tend to have a less positive view of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Citizens who have high ego-defensive needs are mostly marginalized in society, and show political apathy. Additionally, Chinese citizens’ psychological needs remain stable over time, both individually and collectively.

Keywords: Psychological Needs, China, Political Attitudes, Public Opinion, Regime Support