Transitional impact of important life events among Czechs and Slovaks

This study explores the relationship between cultural life scripts and actual life stories of Czechs and Slovaks, building on prior research by Štěpánková et al. (2020. Czech and Slovak life scripts: The rare case of two countries that used to be one. <i>Memory</i>, <i>28</i>(10), 1204-1218) that examined the semantic knowledge of an ideal life within the Czech and Slovak cultures (cultural life scripts). The current study investigates the extent to which individual life stories align with or diverge from these cultural life scripts. A clear reminiscence bump - a concentration of positive memories between the ages of 15 and 30 - was observed in participants' life stories. The impact of most important life events was analysed using the Transitional Impact Scale (TIS). Results showed that positive cultural script-consistent events yielded the highest TIS scores, while unique, script-divergent negative events had greater impact on psychological dimension of the TIS than their positive counterparts. These findings are discussed in the context of existing literature, highlighting their theoretical implications and alignment with prior research.