You seem to be interested in history of mentalities. Try something that is classified under this label. I can recommend "The Great Cat Massacre" by Robert Darnton [1], which is a short and interesting book about 18th century France that is quite easy to read since it is based on a course the author taught at Princeton University. A few years ago I have read "A history of European mentalities" by Peter Dinzelbacher, which covers a lot of topics and seems to be very close to what you want, but I am not sure if it is available in English.

[1] Curiously, there is another book by the same name which is about a different cat massacre.