A professor in the Georgetown University psychology department published a book exploring how omniculturalism has the power to unite humanity, the university announced Aug. 14.

Dr. Fathali Moghaddam’s book, “The Psychology of Multiculturalism, Assimilation and Omniculturalism” examines how omniculturalism, a school of thought that celebrates similarities instead of differences, explores the psychology of intergroup relations. The book, published through Springer, offers an interdisciplinary approach to teaching children about diversity. 

Moghaddam said omniculturalism, which had not been studied in academic work prior to his research, emphasizes at their cores, humans are fundamentally similar. 

“I think I’m the only one to have researched omniculturalism,” Moghaddam said. “I don’t know whether the term was coined before, but I’m the first one to actually empirically research it and to use and publish it in academic work.”

Moghaddam said he was first inspired to research the subject decades ago as a professor at McGill University in Toronto, Canada. The Canadian government was the first country to adopt multiculturalism as a government policy through 1988 legislation that emphasized the importance of Canadians’ multicultural and diverse heritage. 

“While in Canada, together with two professors who have now passed away, I met with Pierre Trudeau, the father of the current prime minister, and we talked about our research on multiculturalism,” Moghaddam said. “Trudeau was the person who introduced multiculturalism policy in Canada, and we talked about some of our misgivings and the research we were doing.”

According to Moghaddam, this policy is flawed because it overemphasizes differences as a means to accept different groups, which is not always effective. 

 “One of the assumptions of multiculturalism is that when you help groups to become confident and to have pride in their individual heritages, they will become open and accepting to other out groups and when we researched this idea, we found that there was a problem,” Moghaddam said. “There was no association between feeling confidence and pride and being open to others.”

Moghaddam said his book proposes an alternative: emphasizing intergroup similarities instead of differences. 

“It’s similarity that causes attraction at the interpersonal level and at the intergroup level,” Moghaddam said. “Now, given that people are attracted to similar others, my question is, what are we doing when we celebrate and exaggerate differences between groups? Are we not creating a problem for ourselves?”

Moghaddam said his book recommends an alternative method of teaching children about difference and diversity. 

“My proposition is that we train children to, first of all, learn what is common to all humanity,” Moghaddam said. “What are human beings like? What are their characteristics? The focus should be on human beings and their rights and duties. At a second stage, around the age of 13 or 14, we train children to also understand that there are group differences, but that these differences are secondary, and that human beings are fundamentally similar around the world.”

Professor Rachel Barr, the chair of the psychology department, said Moghaddam’s book reflects the depth of his long-term research.

“His work often starts conversations about what groups have in common,” Barr wrote to The Hoya. “He has been working on developing this theory over many years.”

Raimundo Salas Schweikart (GRD ’25), a Ph.D. student in psychology and one of Maghaddam’s advisees, said studying with Moghaddam allowed him to hone his research abilities and ability to make connections between interdisciplinary topics.

“I have learned so much, and I’m grateful of having him as my adviser,” Schweikart told The Hoya. “He has truly been like a mentor for me to develop my research skills.”

Schweikart said he performed statistical analysis for the new paper which confirmed Moghaddam’s theories regarding group similarity and acceptance of outside groups. 

Moghaddam said celebrating unity sits at the core of his work. 

“Omni means all,” Moghaddam said. “It is a celebration, first of all, a celebration of human similarities, and it starts by simply noting the fact that human beings are much more similar to one another than they are different.”