Does Contact with Foreigners Reduce Worries about Immigration? A Longitudinal Analysis in Germany

Abstract

This article examines how contact with perceived foreigners affects natives’ attitudes towards immigration. Using six waves of individual level panel data from Germany (2007–2017), we find that natives’ reported mutual visits with foreigners reduce worries about immigration. However, the results do not imply an increase in this effect in the course of repeated contact. Our analyses also consider the possibility that the effect of out-group contact on attitudes is heterogeneous across social groups. Our results show that contact effects are not restricted to younger age groups but also hold for older age groups. Surprisingly, there are stronger reductions in worries among right-leaning compared to left-leaning individuals.

Is There a Rural Penalty in Language Acquisition? Evidence From Germany's Refugee Allocation Policy

“…Especially the latter informal mechanism via social contacts is often neglected in the political debate, with an overly rigid focus on language courses instead. Yet intergroup contacts can also achieve other socially desirable effects in addition to migrants' language acquisition, such as reducing xenophobic attitudes within majority groups (Savelkoul et al, 2017 ; Khalil and Naumann, 2021 ). Therefore, it could also be part of a targeted integration policy, for example, to select accommodation for refugees according to local contact opportunities and to specifically avoid too much ethnic segregation (Ziller and Spörlein, 2020 ).…”

Intergroup Contact and Exposure to Information About Immigrants: Experimental Evidence

“…While this literature consistently reports effects of contact on attitudes toward out-groups such as immigrants (Pettigrew and Tropp 2006), there is conflicting evidence about the direction of the effect. Some studies find that increased contact with immigrants leads natives to develop more positive attitudes toward immigrants and to reduce prejudice (Andersson and Dehdari 2021;Bursztyn et al 2023;Khalil and Naumann 2021), while other studies report opposite effects of contact, suggesting that natives' prejudices and anti-immigrant attitudes are reinforced by increased exposure to immigrant out-groups (Enos 2014;Hangartner et al 2019;Harmon 2018).…”