Discrimination Among Youth of Immigrant Descent in Germany

Abstract

Abstract. Ethnic discrimination has a negative impact on the socioemotional, behavioral, relational, and academic adjustment of adolescents, while belonging with classmates, teachers, heritage, and national group may promote positive socioemotional and academic adjustment. We investigate (1) whether greater discrimination by peers and a lower sense of belonging with classmates, teachers, heritage group, and national group are associated with lower socioemotional and academic adjustment of adolescents of immigrant descent in Germany; and (2) whether a sense of belonging with these different sources acts as a protective factor lowering the negative effects of discrimination on adjustment. Our sample included 439 7th-grade adolescents (51 % female, Mage = 12.4 years) of immigrant descent from 15 Berlin secondary schools. Results showed that higher discrimination was related to greater physiological stress, depressive symptoms, and disruptive school behavior. Higher heritage (but not national) identity, a higher sense of belonging with classmates and with teachers were associated with better socioemotional and academic adjustment. An examination of interaction effects between discrimination and forms of belonging on adjustment revealed that, while the association between discrimination and poorer adjustment weakened for those with higher heritage identity, the association between discrimination and physiological stress increased for those with higher teacher relatedness. We conclude that heritage identity (but not national identity or sense of belonging with classmates) can indeed be a protective factor against the negative effects of discrimination for adolescents of immigrant descent in Germany. Even though belonging with teachers may exacerbate discrimination effects, further investigation with longitudinal data is needed. The findings underline the important role of heritage ties among adolescents of immigrant descent as a source of adjustment, especially in light of discrimination experiences.

Ecologies of Resilience for Australian High School Students from Refugee Backgrounds: Quantitative Study

“…Our findings with this cohort of Australian refugee background youth were not dissimilar to those of minority youth in Canada, where the impact of cultural identity on resilience was significant [ 81 ]. The positive influence of ethnic or cultural identity and belongingness has been noted elsewhere, for example, with immigrant adolescents in Germany [ 82 ]. These studies in Canada and Germany, in addition to the study presented here with refugee background youth in Australia, suggest that it is maintenance of connections to ethnic cultural heritage that are most crucial.…”

Youth experiences of racism and family ethnic‐racial socialization in Germany: What we (don't) know

“…One, it can foster a sense of belonging and clarity regarding one's own ethnic-racial group and thus identification with that group (Huguley, Wang, Vasquez, & Guo, 2019). This is important because studies find that German adolescents of immigrant descent with a stronger and clearer understanding of their heritage culture identity do better in school (Schachner et al, 2014;Spiegler, Sonnenberg, Fassbender, Kohl, & Leyendecker, 2018), are socioemotionally better adjusted (Kunyu et al, 2020;Schotte, Stanat, & Edele, 2018), and have more positive other-group attitudes (Juang, Schachner, Pevec, & Moffitt, 2020).…”

“…When German adolescents of immigrant descent experience discrimination, supportive relations with teachers (Civitillo et al, 2021) and a positive classroom climate (Brenick et al, 2018) can be protective factors. Adolescents who have a stronger sense of belonging with their heritage culture (e.g., stronger heritage culture identity) also have weaker relations between discrimination and poorer socioemotional and academic adjustment (Kunyu, Juang, Schachner, & Schwarzenthal, 2020). These findings are in line with a meta‐analysis of 56 studies (mostly from the U.S., 90%) showing that this belonging dimension of ethnic‐racial identity (and not the exploration dimension) can be protective (Yip, Mootoo, Wang, & Mirpuri, 2019).…”

“No, Where are You Really From?”

“…To go beyond testing measurement properties and provide evidence for substantive relations, we also test whether foreigner objectification is related to life satisfaction and various aspects of school well-being. Based on studies in Germany showing a link between perceived discrimination and poorer psychological and academic well-being (Kunyu et al, 2020;Brenick et al, 2018;Civitillo et al, 2021;Schachner et al, 2018), we expect that the FOBS will relate negatively to subjective school values, school competence beliefs, and life satisfaction, and positively to behavioral school disengagement. Further, previous studies found that adolescents experiencing greater discrimination tend to adopt a stronger ethnic identity based on the rejection-identification hypothesis (Branscombe et al, 1999;Yip, 2018), which suggests that experiencing rejection from the broader society or others of different ethnic heritage leads to people turning toward their own group to reinforce their self-esteem.…”

“…Among German adolescents of migration background more broadly, greater discrimination is related to poorer academic achievement (Schachner et al, 2018). It is also important to highlight that German adolescents of migration background are aware of and resist these experiences of discrimination (Mansel & Spaiser, 2010;, and that the negative effects of discrimination are weakened for adolescents who have a strong connection to their heritage cultural 2 identity (Kunyu et al, 2020), experience a supportive classroom climate (Brenick et al, 2018), and have a positive relationship with their classroom teacher (Civitillo et al, 2021).…”