Family Support Differences Between Immigrant and Non-Immigrant Adolescents Across 30 Countries: Examining the Moderating Role of Cultural Distance, Culture of Origin, and Reception in Receiving Societies

Abstract

Differing theoretical indications suggest that immigrant adolescents’ perceptions of family support will either be lower or higher than those of their non-immigrant peers. To unravel this inconsistency, current cross-national study examines family support differences between first- and second-generation immigrant and non-immigrant adolescents. It also investigates how these differences vary based on restrictive integration policies, anti-immigrant attitudes, and immigrant density in the receiving country, the obedience orientation of the origin country, and the cultural distance in obedience orientation between the origin- and receiving country. Cross-classified multilevel regression analyses were conducted on data from the 2017 to 2018 Health Behavior in School-aged Children survey with a national representative sample of adolescents from 178 origin countries in 30 receiving countries across Europe, Central Asia, and in Israel. Results revealed the variance in family support was small at the level of the origin country (0.73%) and the community (1.24%), while modest at the receiving country level (10.91%). Family support was slightly lower for adolescents of both immigrant generations compared with non-immigrant adolescents, with greater differences for first-than for second-generation immigrants (respectively d = .16 and d = .02). Differences in family support were unrelated to restrictive integration policies, anti-immigrant attitudes, immigrant density, or obedience orientation. However, family support for second-generation immigrant adolescents decreased more compared with non-immigrants when their cultural distance was greater. Concluding, immigrant adolescents’ lower family support, may reflect their exposure to more stressors than non-immigrants. Cultural distance can amplify these stressors, thereby affecting family support for some immigrants more than others.