Feeling Threatened by Immigrants: The Role of Ideology and Subjective Societal Status

Abstract

Threat perceptions towards immigrants continue to gain importance in the context of growing international migration. To reduce associated intergroup conflicts, it is crucial to understand the personal and contextual determinants of perceived threat. In a large online survey study (N = 1,184), we investigated the effects of ideology (i.e., Right-Wing Authoritarianism and Social Dominance Orientation), subjective societal status (SSS) and their interaction effects in predicting symbolic and realistic threat perceptions towards Middle Eastern immigrants. Results showed that ideology (higher RWA and SDO) and lower SSS significantly predicted both symbolic and realistic threat, even after controlling for income, education, age, and gender. Furthermore, ideology and SSS interacted significantly in predicting realistic threat, with higher levels of SDO and RWA enhancing the effect of SSS. In the discussion, we focus on the implications of our findings with respect to understanding societal conflicts, discuss methodological limitations, and provide directions for future research.

Target Congruence as a Means of Understanding the Risk of Bullying Victimization among Multicultural Family Youth in South Korea

“…In many ways, these nationalists seek to “control” males from gaining social, political, and economic power because they perceive them as the more dominant sex, and the one that is more willing and capable of disrupting their ethnically homogenous culture. Indeed, prior research has found “maleness,” or masculinity, of minorities and immigrants to be associated with perceptions of symbolic threats (i.e., threats to one’s values, beliefs, and worldviews) and social dominance orientation (i.e., favoring “in-group” dominance over “out-groups”) (Bollwerk et al, 2020; Connell, 1995; Herz, 2019). As such, we would anticipate those who support Korean nationalism to target multicultural males more than females.…”