Psychological Differences in Stayers and Leavers: Emigration Desires in Central and Eastern European University Students

Abstract

The desires to live in another country or to emigrate from one's country of origin was examined in a sample of 3200 university students from Croatia, the Czech Republic, Poland, Russia, and Slovenia. All of these countries have been experiencing economic difficulties during their transition from socialist to market-driven economies. It was hypothesized that students who wanted to emigrate would score higher in Achievement and Power Motivation and would also show higher levels of Work Centrality and lower levels of Family Centrality than those who wanted to stay in their country of origin. Motive predictors were further expected to be most important for those with high Work Centrality. As predicted, high Work Centrality and low Family Centrality were found to differ for those who wanted to leave as compared to those who wished to remain in their country. The predicted interactions for motivation and Work Centrality were supported. Achievement Motive levels alone did not relate to emigration desires, but Power Motivation did differ for the two groups, as predicted.

Attitudinal Predictors of Potential Illegal Cross-Border Migration

“…The most important factor predicting intentions was attitudes toward illegal immigration justified as a means for improving a person's material standard of living (β= 0.35). This finding may reflect an "egocentric" desire to participate in the consumer culture of the west [13,42]. However, it may also indicate that Bulgarians see illegal immigration as a strong obligation in order to help family if needed [43], and it was the premise for including two intention statements in the dependent variable referring to helping family.…”

“…In order to improve the prediction of intentions to migrate it may be useful to move beyond personality dispositions, and the general attitudes researched by Ådnanes, and Frieze et al [17,13]. The focus of TPB and TRA is on the outcome expectations the person holds for his or her own behaviour.…”

“…Social surveys have estimated the level of potential future emigration by asking representative samples about their migration intentions [18]. Frieze et al [13] point out however, that these studies tell us very little about why specific individuals living under comparable socio-economic conditions choose to migrate or stay at home. Moreover, there are validity problems when using self-assessed intentions to estimate future migration.…”

“…Frieze et al [13] surveyed 3200 university students from Central and Eastern European countries. The participants were asked which country they would like to live in for the major part of their adult life.…”

“…One category of research concentrates on the sociological and macro-economic predictors of emigration [11,12]. A second type focuses on the psychology of emigration including the personality characteristics of potential emigrants [13][14][15][16][17].…”