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Occupational aspirations and ethnic school segregation: social contagion effects among native German and immigrant youths
Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, (2016)
Аннотация
In this study, I broaden the perspective on young immigrants’
aspirations by looking at their social embeddedness in the host
society in terms of their institutionally predefined ties to school
peers. In particular, I investigate the relationship between the
aspirations of immigrant and native youths with special regard to
the social mechanisms that may underlie peer influences. My
analyses are based on multilevel data on ninth graders from the
German National Educational Panel Study. The results show that a
high ratio of immigrants in schools positively influences the
aspirations of both immigrant and native German youths by way
of school climate. However, the same context has different effects
on different groups of origin. For those of Turkish descent, ‘ethnic
schools’ are of twofold significance: first, the aspiration gap
between Turks and native Germans decreases with increasing
segregation, an effect that may be attributable to less perceived
discriminatory experiences in school. Second, Turkish young
people’s stronger adaptation to the climate in ethnically
segregated schools reinforces the protective effect of ethnic
segregation and, additionally, lowers the aspirations of these
youths. That is, immigrants’ stronger orientation towards their ingroup
seems to contribute to a buffer against discrimination.
