scholarly journals Naturalization fosters the long-term political integration of immigrants

2015 ◽  
Vol 112 (41) ◽  
pp. 12651-12656 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jens Hainmueller ◽  
Dominik Hangartner ◽  
Giuseppe Pietrantuono
Keyword(s):  
Natural Experiment ◽  
Political Knowledge ◽  
Independent Effect ◽  
Political Integration ◽  
Selection Effects ◽  
Host Society ◽  
Integration Of Immigrants ◽  
Unbiased Estimates ◽  
New Evidence

Does naturalization cause better political integration of immigrants into the host society? Despite heated debates about citizenship policy, there exists almost no evidence that isolates the independent effect of naturalization from the nonrandom selection into naturalization. We provide new evidence from a natural experiment in Switzerland, where some municipalities used referendums as the mechanism to decide naturalization requests. Balance checks suggest that for close naturalization referendums, which are decided by just a few votes, the naturalization decision is as good as random, so that narrowly rejected and narrowly approved immigrant applicants are similar on all confounding characteristics. This allows us to remove selection effects and obtain unbiased estimates of the long-term impacts of citizenship. Our study shows that for the immigrants who faced close referendums, naturalization considerably improved their political integration, including increases in formal political participation, political knowledge, and political efficacy.

scholarly journals Reducing the Social Assistance Benefits of Refugees Affect Their Resi-dential Integration? Evidence from a Natural Experiment

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Frederik Juhl Jørgensen
Keyword(s):  
Residential Segregation ◽  
Natural Experiment ◽  
Resource Constraints ◽  
Social Assistance ◽  
Host Society ◽  
Random Assignment ◽  
Subsistence Minimum ◽  
The Social ◽  
Low Educated

I exploit quasi-random assignment of social assistance benefits induced by a major Danish reform to obtain credible causal evidence for the effect of social assistance reductions on residential integra-tion (i.e., the extent to which refugees settle among natives). Comparing otherwise similar refugees, I find that reducing the benefits of refugees markedly deteriorated their residential integration espe-cially in the long-term. In particular, refugees’ residential segregation increased by about 28 percent as a consequence of the benefit reductions. I show that this effect most likely runs through a depri-vation mechanism, where refugees live on a subsistence minimum that significantly limit their loca-tion choice. Moreover, I demonstrate that the overall effect is concentrated among the low educated who face the largest resource constraints, most marginalization, and have the worst chances of inte-grating into the host society at the outset.

scholarly journals The lateral intraparietal sulcus takes viewpoint changes into account during memory-guided attention in natural scenes

2021 ◽  
Vol 226 (4) ◽  
pp. 989-1006
Author(s):  
Ilenia Salsano ◽  
Valerio Santangelo ◽  
Emiliano Macaluso
Keyword(s):  
Spatial Information ◽  
Temporal Cortex ◽  
Independent Effect ◽  
Long Term Memory ◽  
Natural Scenes ◽  
Behavioral Measures ◽  
Attention Network ◽  
Low Contrast ◽  
Dorsal Attention Network

AbstractPrevious studies demonstrated that long-term memory related to object-position in natural scenes guides visuo-spatial attention during subsequent search. Memory-guided attention has been associated with the activation of memory regions (the medial-temporal cortex) and with the fronto-parietal attention network. Notably, these circuits represent external locations with different frames of reference: egocentric (i.e., eyes/head-centered) in the dorsal attention network vs. allocentric (i.e., world/scene-centered) in the medial temporal cortex. Here we used behavioral measures and fMRI to assess the contribution of egocentric and allocentric spatial information during memory-guided attention. At encoding, participants were presented with real-world scenes and asked to search for and memorize the location of a high-contrast target superimposed in half of the scenes. At retrieval, participants viewed again the same scenes, now all including a low-contrast target. In scenes that included the target at encoding, the target was presented at the same scene-location. Critically, scenes were now shown either from the same or different viewpoint compared with encoding. This resulted in a memory-by-view design (target seen/unseen x same/different view), which allowed us teasing apart the role of allocentric vs. egocentric signals during memory-guided attention. Retrieval-related results showed greater search-accuracy for seen than unseen targets, both in the same and different views, indicating that memory contributes to visual search notwithstanding perspective changes. This view-change independent effect was associated with the activation of the left lateral intra-parietal sulcus. Our results demonstrate that this parietal region mediates memory-guided attention by taking into account allocentric/scene-centered information about the objects' position in the external world.

scholarly journals Behavioral medicine challenges in the shadow of a global pandemic

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alyssa T Brooks ◽  
Hannah K Allen ◽  
Louise Thornton ◽  
Tracy Trevorrow
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Factors ◽  
Health Behavior ◽  
Health Behaviors ◽  
Natural Experiment ◽  
Direct Effects ◽  
Global Pandemic ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Future Data ◽  
Short And Long Term

Abstract Health behavior researchers should refocus and retool as it becomes increasingly clear that the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic surpass the direct effects of COVID-19 and include unique, drastic, and ubiquitous consequences for health behavior. The circumstances of the pandemic have created a natural experiment, allowing researchers focusing on a wide range of health behaviors and populations with the opportunity to use previously collected and future data to study: (a) changes in health behavior prepandemic and postpandemic, (b) health behavior prevalence and needs amidst the pandemic, and (c) the effects of the pandemic on short- and long-term health behavior. Our field is particularly challenged as we attempt to consider biopsychosocial, political, and environmental factors that affect health and health behavior. These realities, while daunting, should call us to action to refocus and retool our research, prevention, and intervention efforts

The New Chinese Community in New Zealand: Local Outcomes of Transnationalism

2001 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 213-240 ◽  
Author(s):  
Manying Ip Wardlow Friesen
Keyword(s):  
New Zealand ◽  
Return Migration ◽  
Host Society ◽  
Chinese Community ◽  
Republic Of China ◽  
Economic Motivation ◽  
Economic Miracle ◽  
Chinese Migrants ◽  
Depth Interviews

The new Chinese community in New Zealand (formed since 1987) is made up of immigrants from the People's Republic of China, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Malaysia as well as other countries. Initially looked upon as harbingers of the “Asian economic miracle” by the New Zealand government, the new arrivals met with numerous unforeseen difficulties. This article is based on the findings of surveys and in-depth interviews in which the primary migrants were asked about their motives for migration, the economic and social outcomes of their migration, their perception of the comparative strengths of their native land and New Zealand, and their long-term view on settlement and return migration. The surveys are also set against background statistics from the 1996 census as well as immigration figures up to 2000. The findings challenge the assumption of the importance of the economic motivation of migration, and point to the primacy of social and environmental factors. They also suggest that transnationalism is a long-term strategy, instead of a temporary expediency, but also that most Chinese migrants in New Zealand have tried to integrate with the host society when possible.

scholarly journals Supporting the development of scientific understanding when constructing an evolving explanation

2022 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ann M. Novak ◽  
David F. Treagust
Keyword(s):  
Scientific Explanation ◽  
Project Based Learning ◽  
Incremental Development ◽  
Freshwater Organisms ◽  
Freshwater System ◽  
New Evidence ◽  
Scientific Ideas ◽  
Over Time

AbstractWe explore how students developed an integrated understanding of scientific ideas and how they applied their understandings in new situations. We examine the incremental development of 7th grade students’ scientific ideas across four iterations of a scientific explanation related to a freshwater system. We demonstrate that knowing how to make use of scientific ideas to explain phenomena needs to be learned just as developing integrated understanding of scientific ideas needs to be learned. Students participated in an open-ended, long-term project-based learning unit, constructing one explanation over time to address, “How healthy is our stream for freshwater organisms and how do our actions on land potentially impact the water quality of the stream?” The explanation developed over several weeks as new data were collected and analyzed. Students discussed evidence by revisiting scientific ideas and including new scientific ideas. This research investigates two questions: (1) As students engage in writing a scientific explanation over time, to what extent do they develop integrated understanding of appropriate scientific ideas? and (2) When writing about new evidence, do these earlier experiences of writing explanations enable students to make use of new scientific ideas in more sophisticated ways? In other words, do earlier experiences allow students to know how to make use of their ideas in these new situations? The results indicated statistically significant effects. Through various iterations of the explanation students included richer discussion using appropriate scientific ideas. Students were also able to make better use of new knowledge in new situations.

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