nostalgia

nostalgia, affectionate and often sentimental feeling experienced when remembering past times, places, and experiences, especially those with happy personal associations. The feeling may also connote a desire to return to past times and places or wishing that they could be experienced again. Feelings of nostalgia are often triggered when people encounter a familiar smell or sound, when they speak to others, or when they feel lonely.

History

The term “nostalgia” was coined by Swiss medical student Johannes Hofer by blending the Greek words nostos (“return” or “homecoming”) and algos (“pain”). It first appeared in print in 1688 as Dissertatio Medica de Nostalgia, oder Heimweh (“Medical Dissertation on Nostalgia, or Homesickness”), in which Hofer described the feeling as a “cerebral disease” that afflicts young soldiers, students, and domestic servants who are sent abroad and become consumed by a desire to return to their homeland.

Hofer suggested that symptoms of nostalgia included weeping, lethargy, insomnia, anxiety, heart palpitations, confusion, and obsessively thinking about home. For some, the disease was fatal. Death was often caused by a sufferer’s refusal to eat, which resulted in the person’s starving to death, dying by suicide, self-neglecting, or falling victim to fatal illnesses brought on by a weakened immune system. Hofer believed that nostalgia was caused by the “continuous vibration of animal spirits through those fibers of the middle brain in which impressed traces of ideas of the Fatherland still cling” and that the sole remedy was for the sufferer to return to their homeland.

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Dissenting opinions placed nostalgia as less of a psychological condition and more of a neurological disease. For example, the physician J.J. Scheuchzer suggested that nostalgia was caused by changes in air pressure, especially as its incidence was high among Swiss mercenaries who would descend from their homes in the Alps to lower regions of Europe. Other doctors suggested that cowbells of the Alps contributed to brain damage—then categorized this, too, as nostalgia.

The definition of nostalgia evolved over time; by the early 19th century nostalgia was regarded not so much as a disease but as a type of depression or melancholia. By the beginning of the 20th century scholars of psychodynamic theory found the symptoms of nostalgia to better align with psychological conditions such as shell shock (now known as post-traumatic stress disorder), schizophrenia, and anxiety. During this time, psychoanalysts had little tolerance for nostalgic patients, believing that they were neurotic and unwilling to meet reality head-on. Wealth played a role in such thinking, as doctors accused those in lower social classes to be more prone to the condition.

It wasn’t until the late 20th century that nostalgia came to be viewed in a more positive light. Though nostalgia had most commonly been associated with homesickness, sociologist Fred Davis described in his book Yearning for Yesterday: A Sociology of Nostalgia (1979) that people are typically able to differentiate nostalgia from homesickness. In the 21st century nostalgia became known as a predominantly positive phenomenon and a valuable psychological resource. The term is also used to refer to wistful feelings about one’s childhood and the pop culture associated with the time, and companies may even market certain items as nostalgia-themed.

Types of nostalgia

The Russian American theorist Svetlana Boym described two types of nostalgia in her book The Future of Nostalgia (2001). Restorative nostalgia looks back at the past with a desire to re-create it and to relive special times. When people are restoratively nostalgic, they focus on re-creating what they perceive to be an idealized golden age of their lives. Restorative nostalgia is generally associated with feelings of sadness, regret, and longing. 

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Boym classified reflective nostalgia, on the other hand, as accepting the past for what it was and recognizing that certain changes may have been for the better. When people are reflectively nostalgic, they do not attempt to re-create the past; rather, they take pleasure in experiencing the emotions that are tied to happy memories. Reflective nostalgia is frequently associated with warmth, comfort, and joy.

Benefits and downsides of nostalgia

Some research has demonstrated that nostalgia may have both physical and psychological benefits. However, much research about the feeling has conflicting results and even shows negative effects of nostalgia, partially because of the open-ended definition of the term nostalgia itself. In a review of nostalgia research, psychologists Georgios Abakoumkin and Jeffrey D. Green place findings in a “healthy” but “far from settled” position.

Nostalgia may improve physical health by bolstering people’s attitudes about their health, which can lead them to increase their physical activity, follow a more healthful diet, and reduce behaviors that could put their health at risk. It has also been linked to boosting immune system function, decreasing blood pressure, reducing stress and anxiety levels, and lessening the effects of physical pain.

Psychological benefits of experiencing nostalgia may include improving self-esteem, increasing positive moods, feeling a stronger sense of belonging, and feeling loved and protected. People may also feel that their lives have been more meaningful. Nostalgia can help people regroup and cope during times of loneliness or instability or after a major life change, such as divorce or the loss of a loved one. Some studies have shown that during difficult times, nostalgia may actually inspire and energize people to spend more time with others.

When people engage in nostalgia to an excessive extent, it can have negative effects, many of which directly oppose purported positive effects. It can cause people to feel lonely, isolated, and unhappy and less likely to take positive action moving forward. However, there are several strategies people can use to avoid the negative effects of nostalgia, such as engaging in activities that make them happy, connecting with others, practicing mindfulness, keeping things in perspective, and trying new foods or activities.