Refugees (Un)Welcome – Regional Demographic Changes and Individual Attitudes Towards Refugees

Alyna Paul

No 1231, SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research from DIW Berlin, The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP)

Abstract: Background: The co-occurrence of many refugees arriving in Germany in 2015 and 2016 and the increase in anti-refugee attitudes among Germans suggests an association. High levels of public concern about immigration, now again in 2025, emphasize the importance of identifying predictors of attitudes towards refugees in general. Aims: The objective is to test whether high regional shares of refugees (share variable) and large positive regional changes in the shares of refugees (change variable) tend to increase individuals’ negative attitudes towards refugees. Data: The analysis was based on representative individual-level and county-level panel data for 2016, 2018, and 2020 from Germany, provided by the SOEP and the INKAR. The target population consisted of adults living in Germany who had not changed counties and had not been refugees in 2015 or after. After listwise deletion, 30,266 individuals with 61,444 observations residing in 398 counties remained for analysis (MAge = 53.07 years, %Men = 49). Design: Attitudes towards refugees were estimated through an average score of five items concerning the expected cultural and economic risks or opportunities of refugee immigration. Apart from regional-level variables, several individual characteristics were included as predictors in the longitudinal and cross-sectional linear multi-level regression models.Findings: The longitudinal analysis indicated no relationship between regional share or change in the share of refugees and the individual attitudes towards refugees. Although the coefficients pointed in the expected direction, they were very small and only marginally statistically significant, with β11 = 0.023, 95%CI [0.001,0.044] for the share variable and β12 = 0.011, 95%CI [−0.002,0.024] for the change variable. The cross-sectional analysis showed that solely in 2020, the share variable was statistically significant, albeit marginally and unexpectedly negative. Thus, the small longitudinal effect was not even stable over time. Instead, education and whether someone had been socialized in East or West Germany were the strongest predictors of attitudes towards refugees. Conclusions: Negative attitudes towards refugees are independent of the actual regional share and change in the share of refugees. This indicates that restricting immigration would not reduce public concern or foster integration.

Pages: 92, XXIV p.
Date: 2025
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