What is this description of a pattern of group behaviour towards individuals within Nordic countries that Sharmi Albrechtsen explored in her book A Piece of Danish Happiness?
Law of Jante The Law of Jante (Danish: "Janteloven" , ] ; Norwegian Bokmål: "Janteloven" , ] , Nynorsk: "Jantelova" ; Icelandic: "Jantelögin" ;,Faroese: "Jantelógin" Swedish: "Jantelagen" , ] ) is the description of a pattern of group behaviour towards individuals within Nordic countries that negatively portrays and criticises individual success and achievement as unworthy and inappropriate. The Jante Law as a concept was created by the Dano-Norwegian author Aksel Sandemose, who, in his novel "A Fugitive Crosses His Tracks" ("En flyktning krysser sitt spor", 1933, English translation published in the USA in 1936), identified the Law of Jante as ten rules. Sandemose's novel portrays the small Danish town Jante (modelled upon his native town Nykøbing Mors as it was at the beginning of the 20th century, but typical of all small towns and communities), where nobody is anonymous.
Collective mental state Mental state is generally a literary or legal term, and is only used in psychiatry or psychology as the mental state examination, where it refers to the condition of someone's mind. Here there is an assessment of thought processes, memory, mood, cognitive state, and energy level. Where a mental state is shared by a large proportion of the members of a group or society, it can be called a collective mental state. Gustave Le Bon proposed that mental states are passed by contagion, while Sigmund Freud wrote of war fever in his work "Group Psychology and the Analysis of the Ego" (1922), a perfect example of the collective mental state. Franz Borkenau wrote of collective madness, while many writers have discussed collective depression. Psychosis can be passed from one individual to another as induced psychosis or "folie a deux", but rarely involves more than two people. Where the mental state involves a large population, it is more appropriate to use plain English rather than psychiatric or psychological terminology.