SOEP Research: Migration and Integration

Bridging Distance: Transnational and Local Family Ties in Refugees’ Social Support Networks

This study examines the familial ties in the social support network of refugees in Germany. It investigates whether distance to family plays a role in the provision of emotional and informational support and how this relationship is moderated by social network services (SNS). Using data from the IAB-BAMF-SOEP Survey of Refugees (N = 5237), the paper provides evidence for a family-centred network. Increasing ...

Restricted healthcare puts a strain on refugees and society

Establishing a Probability Sample in a Crisis Context: The Example of Ukrainian Refugees in Germany in 2022

Following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in early 2022, more than one million refugees have arrived in Germany. These Ukrainian refugees differ in many aspects from Germany’s past forced migration experiences and there exists an urgent need for sound data and information for politics, practitioners, and academics. In response, the IAB-BiB/FReDA-BAMF-SOEP study was established to provide high-quality ...

Housing and Health: A Multidimensional, Qualitative Analysis of the Experiences of Asylum Seekers and Refugees Living in German Reception Centres

Objectives Housing is an important social determinant of health, but the perspectives of asylum seekers and refugees (ASR) in large, centralised reception centres remain under-researched. We therefore sought to examine which housing aspects in reception centres are deemed relevant for health by ASR in Germany.MethodsBased on 47 interviews with 42 ASR in Germany originating from three different studies, ...

Proximity to Refugee Accommodations Does not Affect Locals’ Attitudes toward Refugees: Evidence from Germany

With the so-called 'long summer of migration' of 2015, there was an urgent need to accommodate many refugees in Germany. This situation was framed as a 'refugee reception crisis', and it revealed diametrically opposed stances within German society. Within this debate, anti-refugee sentiment is often explained with the placement of nearby refugee reception facilities. Conclusive evidence of this claim ...

Refugee women's labor market participation is increasing

Wohnsitzauflage: An opportunity for integration? The Impact of Residential Obligation Policy on Refugee Women’s Labor Market Participation

*************POSTPONED*****************To promote integration, the German government enacted the Residential Obligation Act (Wohnsitzauflage) in 2016, which obliges refugees to maintain their residence in the states to which they have been assigned for a period of three years from the time they are granted asylum or temporary residence. Studies addressing this policy have found controversial...

High-profile crime and perceived public safety: evidence from Cologne's New Year's Eve in 2015

joint with Alexander Schmidt-Catran, Goethe-Universität Frankfurt This study analyses the impact of a high-profile crime event on perceived public safety. At the 2015 New Year's Eve celebrations in Cologne (NYE), Germany, refugees allegedly committed thousands of crimes, ranging from theft to sexual assault. The widespread media coverage of these incidents has made a shift in the publics’...

Migration and Dynamics in Men’s and Women’s Domestic Work

International migration of couples is rising. Still, there is little evidence on men’s and women’s domestic work hours before and after migration. This is despite the fact that domestic work provides deep insights into family life and, for migrants, is directly linked to integration. Therefore, this study examines how immigrant men and women change their domestic work hours following migration, using ...

First Time around: Local Conditions and Multi-dimensional Integration of Refugees

We study the effect of local unemployment and attitudes towards immigrants at the time of arrival on refugees’ multi-dimensional integration outcomes. We leverage a centralized allocation policy in Germany where refugees were centrally assigned to live in specific counties. To measure sentiments of native residents towards immigrants, we use geo-coded Twitter data, which provides our “negative sentiment ...