Views of the Interrelationships of the Dimensions of Developmental Idealism and Family Life: Evidence from Nepal

We examine how people understand and conceptualize developmental idealism – a cultural schema that links ideas about societal and familial development. For centuries, scholars and policy makers have written that the world is dynamic, changing from traditional to modern, that modern families are causes of modern societies, that modern societies are causes of modern families, and that modern societies and families are better than traditional ones. These ideas have spread widely around the world, with the capacity for fostering change. The question motivating our research concerns the extent to which people link together the various aspects of developmental idealism as a package. Do individuals who endorse one aspect of developmental idealism endorse other aspects, or is there little relationship between how individuals evaluate the various aspects? We investigate these issues using 2008 data collected in Nepal. Our data indicate that Nepalis link some aspects of developmental idealism together but not others.