Do dependents matter? Exploring multiple dimensions of attitudes toward immigration and immigrants

Abstract

ABSTRACT Most extant research on natives’ attitudes toward immigration and immigrants (ATII) pays scant attention to the explanandum: predictors are widely assumed to apply across attitudinal facets regardless of how the dependent was defined and operationalized. This paper employs a sequence of factor and regression analyses to explore the dimensional structure of ATII in Spain, based on survey data collected in 2020 (N = 2,344). The most parsimonious factor solution for our dataset’s broad basket of attitude gauges distinguishes impact assessments and migration policy preferences (‘attitudes toward immigration’) neatly from sentiment toward various immigrant groups (‘attitudes toward immigrants’); the ensuing latent variables correlate with differentiated sets of predictors. Predictors based on extant theorizing prove highly pertinent for immigration attitudes, but contribute less to explaining anti-immigrant sentiment. In a more fine-grained factor solution, conceptually coherent ramifications emerge within both of these main dimensions; again, the more nuanced attitude components are associated with differentiated predictor profiles. These findings caution against the widely held notion that any sentiment or appraisal regarding international migration and migrants expresses a general attitude in this realm, instead encouraging researchers to acknowledge the complexity of ATII and pursue facet-specific explanations.