Artikel
Discrimination against migrants in Germany: Does social capital moderate harmful effects on mental health?
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Autoren
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Louise Biddle
- DIW Berlin, Berlin, Germany
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Barbara Stacherl
- DIW Berlin, Berlin, Germany
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Ellen Heidinger
- DIW Berlin, Berlin, Germany
| Veröffentlicht: | 6. September 2024 |
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Gliederung
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The harmful mental health effects of perceived discrimination are well established. However, the potential buffering effects of regional-level social capital has not previously been explored in this context.
Using data from the German Socioeconomic Panel (SOEP; 2010–2021) we apply random effects models to assess the effect of perceived discrimination on mental health (mcs subscale of the SF-12) adjusting for individual socio-demographic factors and regional-level socioeconomic deprivation. We assess interaction with general social capital (civic organisations, electoral turnout, generalised trust) and migrant-specific resources (proportion of non-nationals and share of far-right votes). We juxtapose non-refugee migrants (n= 13478) with refugees subject to mobility restrictions (n=5558) to assess for bias introduced by selective mobility into regions.
In the non-refugee sample, we confirm negative effects of frequent discrimination experiences on mcs (β: -3.74; 95%CI: -4.39, -3.08). The effect of infrequent experiences of discrimination is also evident, but less pronounced (β: -1.88; 95%CI: -2.23, -1.52). Moderation analyses show insignificant results for general social capital, but a negative interaction effect of proportion of non-nationals (β: -0.71; 95%CI: -1.34, -0.08). Analyses among refugees confirm the negative effect of discrimination on mcs (β: -6.29; 95%CI: -7.49, -5.08) and the moderating effect of the proportion of non-nationals (β: -1.63; 95%CI: -2.78, -0.48), as well as showing a positive moderation effect for generalised trust (β: 0.84; 95%CI: 0.11-1.57).
Results demonstrate the negative implications of living in areas with a high proportion of non-nationals for migrants experiencing discrimination, which may be explained by the higher marginalisation of migrants in these areas and increased service access barriers. The absence of a moderation effect of general social capital appears to be the result of selection bias, with positive effects of generalised trust seen for refugee migrants. Further research at more finely grained spatial scales is required to confirm results.
The authors declare that they have no competing interests.
The authors declare that an ethics committee vote is not required.
