Acculturation in Context: The Moderating Effects of Immigrant and Native Peer Orientations on the Acculturation Experiences of Immigrants

Abstract

Immigrant adolescents have to navigate through a complex social environment consisting of, at least, both a native and a co-ethnic community. This study used a multi-level framework to consider two research questions involving this complexity. The individual-level associations of acculturation orientations and acculturative hassles (language and sociocultural adaptation) was assessed in immigrant youths, and whether this association differs depending on the school-level acculturation orientations held by co-ethnic peers, and the school-level orientations toward immigrants held by native German peers. We then investigated whether acculturative hassles are associated with the psychosocial functioning (self-efficacy, depressive symptoms) of immigrant adolescents. The sample comprised 650 ethnic German Diaspora migrant adolescents (mean age 15.6 years, 53.7 % female) and their 787 native German peers (mean age 15.05 years, 51 % female). The results showed that contextual factors (co-ethnic acculturation orientation, native friendship preferences) moderated the association between the acculturation orientations of adolescent immigrants and both types of acculturative hassles. Acculturative hassles, in turn, were associated with the psychosocial functioning of adolescents. This research demonstrates that a person-by-context perspective is needed to better understand the adaptation of adolescent immigrants. This perspective has to take into account both the native and the co-ethnic peer environment.

Fitting in: How the intergroup context shapes minority acculturation and achievement

“…In today's highly diverse schools as key intergroup contexts for minority achievement, we conceive of acculturative fit as negotiated in relation to acculturation-norms in mixed minority and majority peer groups. Along those lines, Titzmann and Jugert (2015) measured acculturationnorms in mixed peer groups in German secondary schools and tested the interplay of both minority and majority group norms with immigrant minorities' individual acculturationorientations and their socio-cultural adaptation. Using multi-level analysis, they specified actual group norms as school-level contextual moderators of individual-level acculturationadaptation associations.…”

Longing for a sense of belonging—Somali immigrant adolescents’ experiences of their acculturation efforts in Sweden

“…For instance, immigrant adolescents undergo acculturation changes alongside possibly simultaneous developmental, biological, and social changes that affect their acculturation experiences (Titzmann & Jugert, 2015;Titzmann & Lee, 2018). Among the social changes is the aspect of inclusion or exclusion among peers.…”

Understanding adolescents’ acculturation processes: New insights from the intergroup perspective

“…In addition, the attitudes of native adolescents’ parents on the value of classroom cultural diversity might be considered as an important indicator of acculturation preferences of native adolescents in future studies (Arar, Örücü, & Ak Küçükçayir, 2019). Second, in line with the recent advancements in the acculturation literature, adolescents’ acculturation processes were examined in relationship to family and peer contexts; however, future studies might investigate the role of the entire school context, including the attitudes of teachers and school principals (Arar, Orucu, & Ak Kucukcayir, 2018; Crul, 2019; Schachner, 2019) as well as considering other family members, such as grandparents (Jackson, Mitchell, Snyder, & Samuels, 2020) and siblings (Cardwell & Soliz, 2019), as well as peers from one's own (and other) migrant groups (Titzmann & Jugert, 2015).…”