Public Attitudes Toward Immigration

Jens Hainmueller; Daniel J. Hopkins

doi:10.1146/annurev-polisci-102512-194818

journal article May 11, 2014

Public Attitudes Toward Immigration

Jens Hainmueller

Daniel J. Hopkins

Annual Review of Political Science Vol. 17 No. 1 pp. 225-249 · Annual Reviews

View at Publisher Save 10.1146/annurev-polisci-102512-194818

Abstract

Immigrant populations in many developed democracies have grown rapidly, and so too has an extensive literature on natives' attitudes toward immigration. This research has developed from two theoretical foundations, one grounded in political economy, the other in political psychology. These two literatures have developed largely in isolation from one another, yet the conclusions that emerge from each are strikingly similar. Consistently, immigration attitudes show little evidence of being strongly correlated with personal economic circumstances. Instead, research finds that immigration attitudes are shaped by sociotropic concerns about its cultural impacts—and to a lesser extent its economic impacts—on the nation as a whole. This pattern of results has held up as scholars have increasingly turned to experimental tests, and it holds for the United States, Canada, and Western Europe. Still, more work is needed to strengthen the causal identification of sociotropic concerns and to isolate precisely how, when, and why they matter for attitude formation.

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References

Details

Published: May 11, 2014
Vol/Issue: 17(1)
Pages: 225-249

Authors

J

Jens Hainmueller

Department of Political Science, Stanford University, Stanford, California 94305;

D

Daniel J. Hopkins

Department of Government, Georgetown University, Washington, DC 20057;

Cite This Article

Jens Hainmueller, Daniel J. Hopkins (2014). Public Attitudes Toward Immigration. Annual Review of Political Science, 17(1), 225-249. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-polisci-102512-194818

Public Attitudes Toward Immigration

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