Migration and neighbourhood trust: Evidence from urban China

Xiaobin Zhang, Linlin Zhang, Xiaoqiang Shen and Huiling Huang
Additional contact information
Xiaobin Zhang: Lanzhou University, China
Linlin Zhang: Hangzhou City University, China
Xiaoqiang Shen: Lanzhou University, China
Huiling Huang: Heilongjiang University of Science and Technology, China

Urban Studies, 2025, vol. 62, issue 7, 1397-1416

Abstract: Neighbourhood outcomes of migration have drawn considerable scholarly attention. Previous studies consider neighbourhood trust an indicator of social integration or social resources, revealing inconclusive findings regarding the effects of migration. Unlike previous studies, we view neighbourhood trust as a lifestyle feature. Combining urbanism theory and a typology of trust, we argue that migration causes a reduction in migrants’ neighbourhood trust through the assimilation of the urbanism lifestyle. We provide nationwide empirical evidence of the causal relationship between migration and neighbourhood trust and reveal the underlying mechanism. Our study identifies this relationship in urban China by applying a difference-in-differences empirical strategy and using the China Family Panel Survey. The results show that migration lowers neighbourhood trust levels by 0.473 from a sample mean of 6.692. We find that the declining effect is greater for rural–urban migrants than for within-urban migrants, and it is greater for rural–urban migrants who acquire urban hukou than for those who do not. We also show that rural–urban migration leads to an increase in trust in strangers. Together, these results support our hypothesis that the assimilation of the urbanism lifestyle is a critical mechanism through which migration undermines neighbourhood trust.

Keywords: lifestyle; migration; neighbourhood trust; rural–urban migrants; urbanism; 生活方å¼; 移民; 邻里信任; ä¹¡æ ‘åˆ°åŸŽå¸‚è¿ ç§»è€…; 城市化 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/00420980241288473 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:urbstu:v:62:y:2025:i:7:p:1397-1416

DOI: 10.1177/00420980241288473

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Urban Studies from Urban Studies Journal Limited
Bibliographic data for series maintained by SAGE Publications ().