Attitudes of minority and majority members towards adaptation of immigrants

✍ Scribed by Jan Pieter Van Oudenhoven; Karin S. Prins; Bram P. Buunk

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 1998
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 222 KB
• Volume: 28
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0046-2772
• DOI: 10.1002/(sici)1099-0992(1998110)28:6<995::aid-ejsp908>3.0.co;2-8

✦ Synopsis

In two studies, one among 94 Moroccan and 203 Turkish immigrants in the Netherlands and one among 1844 people of the Dutch majority, we examined how these groups react to four dierent adaptation strategies of people with a Moroccan and a Turkish background. These strategies are: assimilation (original culture is considered unimportant whereas contact with the majority is considered important), integration (both the original culture and contact with the majority are important), separation (original culture is considered important whereas contact with the majority is not), and marginalization (both the original culture and contact with the majority are considered unimportant). The respondents were confronted with a scenario (a ®ctitious newspaper article) representing one of the four strategies. Moroccans and Turks had to indicate whether they identi®ed themselves with the person in the scenario. Their aective and normative reactions towards that person were also measured. Both Moroccans and Turks appeared to react most positively to integration and to identify themselves most with an integrating person. Dutch majority members were asked to estimate the percentage of Moroccans or Turks that use a particular adaptation form, and were also asked to give their aective and normative reactions towards the person in the scenario. The Dutch have positive attitudes towards assimilation and integration. Remarkably, they believe that separation, which is the least liked strategy by them, is the one chosen most frequently by the immigrants. # 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Several Western European countries are on their way to becoming multicultural societies. Ethnic groups are often motivated to retain aspects of their cultures rather than to assimilate into mainstream society (Taylor & Moghaddam, 1994). Diversity can be bene®cial in utilizing the unique contributions of people from dierent