National and transnational belonging among Turkish and Moroccan older migrants in the Netherlands: protective against loneliness?

Abstract

This research investigates how a sense of belonging functions as protective mechanism against loneliness. Inspired by the work of Berry (1980) on acculturation strategies (i.e. integration, assimilation, separation and marginalization), we distinguish migrants who feel a relatively strong or weak sense of belonging to larger society and those who feel a strong or weak belonging to the “own group.” We expect that more national belonging contributes to less loneliness. We add a transnational perspective by arguing that feelings of belonging to the own group can take place in the country of settlement, but can also be transnational, i.e. a feeling of belonging to the country of origin. Transnational belonging can protect against loneliness, as it acknowledges the importance of place attachment. Using data from the Longitudinal Aging Study Amsterdam on older migrants aged 55–66, we employ latent class analysis and find five national belonging clusters, interpretable in terms of Berry’s acculturation strategies. Further analyses reveal mixed evidence: some aspects of transnational belonging vary with belonging to the own group, but other aspects point to a third dimension of belonging. Regression analysis shows that those marginalized are loneliest and that a transnational sense of belonging contributes to more loneliness. We conclude that Berry’s (1980) typology is useful for interpreting older migrants’ national belonging and that a transnational sense of belonging is apparent among older migrants, but needs to be explored further.

Loneliness in mid-life and older adults from ethnic minority communities in England and Wales: measure validation and prevalence estimates

“…The finding of consistently low (relative) loneliness rates across all measures for our Indian group is intriguing and merits further investigation both quantitatively and qualitatively as does the high levels of loneliness among Chinese participants. Our modelling, alongside that of Fokkema and Naderi (2013) and Klok et al (2017), suggests that it may not be ethnicity per se that is responsible for elevated levels of loneliness among minority groups but rather exposure to loneliness vulnerability factors. We will explore these issues in more depth in our future work, given that we have established confidence in the utility of our measures.…”

Reducing Suicidal Ideation among Turkish Migrants in the Netherlands and in the UK A Pilot RCT of a guided Online Intervention

“…Germany, the Netherlands, and the UK) in recent years (78). This new group of Turkish migrants might have different micro-identities compared to the Turkish migrant populations with a long-standing history of settlement who have strong ties with their heritage culture (79). Even though we do not have information about the migration history of the participants, it might be that our sample was more representative of the recent group and this might have restricted the usability of the intervention in their daily life.…”

“…These differences could be explained with the cultural differences in help-seeking patterns. For instance, it is well-known that Turkish migrants tend to delay help-seeking until the symptoms of distress are more severe (65)(66)(67)(68)(69)(70)(71)(72)(73)(74)(75)(76)(77)(78)(79)(80). It could be that when the psychological distress caused by suicidal thoughts is unbearable then stigma and shame attached to suicide might have less influence on their motivation to seek help.…”

The Longitudinal Aging Study Amsterdam: cohort update 2019 and additional data collections

“…In the past few years, various studies using data from the LASA migrant cohort have been published. Two studies were conducted on transnational belonging [53,54]. One study found that those feeling marginalized were lonelier and that transnational belonging was not protective of loneliness [53].…”

“…Two studies were conducted on transnational belonging [53,54]. One study found that those feeling marginalized were lonelier and that transnational belonging was not protective of loneliness [53]. The other study investigated determinants of transnational behavior and transnational belonging.…”