Emotional fit in ratings versus language: A study of the emotional experiences of Dutch-speaking Belgians and Turkish migrants in Belgium

Abstract

Abstract When two or more people have the same emotion in relation to a situation, they are making meaning of it in the same way. Previous research has shown that the extent to which immigrant minorities share similar emotions with the receiving majority culture – termed ‘emotional fit’ – may bring better integration outcomes. Emotional fit is typically measured by comparing immigrants’ self-reported emotion intensity ratings to those of the average majority culture, at the expense of other aspects of emotion that might be relevant for meaning-making. To address these shortcomings, we implemented an alternative measure of emotional fit using natural language descriptions of emotional experience. Dutch-speaking Belgians and Turkish migrants in Belgium (Ns = 100) were interviewed about four recent emotional situations, two negative and two positive, for each one rating the intensity of their experience on a set of standardized emotion terms. Patterns of language used in the situation descriptions were more effective than patterns of intensity ratings in distinguishing between cultures, such that people fit better with their own culture than with the other, regardless of whether this was assessed within- or between-persons. Language- and rating-based fit measures were not positively correlated; rather, Turkish migrants’ rating fit with Belgian culture was negatively related to their language fit in negative situations, suggesting that even when they felt the same emotions, they were attending to different aspects of the experience. Future research is needed to further disentangle culture-specific patterns of emotional meaning-making and their implications for relevant outcomes for immigrant minorities.