Correlates of Length of Urban Residence among the Spokane Indians

Abstract

Previous research has considered factors associated with the decision by Indian people to migrate to an urban environment. Rather than focus on the initial decision, this paper examines the percentage of the person's adult life that has been lived in an urban environment. Six hypotheses relating employment, income, education, housing, acceptance of white culture, and Indian ancestry to continued urban residence are tested. The data were collected in 1967 from interviews with a sample of 100 adult Spokane Indians living both in Spokane city (50 respondents) and on the Spokane reservation (50 respondents). The analysis included calculation of bivariate correlation coefficients and a multivariate stepwise multiple regression analysis.The most significant finding to emerge is the eminence of noneconomic factors—Indian ancestry and Indian self identification—in explaining Spokane Indian people's migration to and continued residence in an urban setting. Approximately 25% of the variance in urban residence is accounted for by a combination of the independent variables in multiple regression analysis.