Dimensions of community identity

The important research area of community identity has failed to develop a practical means of measurement and comparative analysis. Scrutiny of the research literature suggests that this is in part due to the conceptual difficulties related to community in general, a restrictive emphasis on individual level psychological variables, and a reluctance or inability to proceed beyond exploratory methods of research to fuller field studies. Through a review of the related research in community identity in the UK, and from wider research in the areas of Psychological Sense of Community, Social Cohesion, and Community Satisfaction, a number of underlying dimensions of community identity are identified.