The trouble with assimilation: Social dominance and the emergence of hostility against immigrants

Abstract

In exploring the “status boundary enforcement hypothesis,” Thomsen, Green and Sidanius (2008) theorized and confirmed that Social Dominance Orientation would be more strongly correlated with a general willingness to aggress against immigrants when respondents are primed with an immigrant who is eager to assimilate into the dominant culture than when they are primed with an immigrant who prefers cultural isolation (separation). However, because assimilation differs from separation on both the home culture component and the host culture component, the actual source of this effect remains unclear. By using an assimilation versus integration contrast that differ only on the home culture component, the present study confirmed and extended Thomsen et al.’s findings. We were able to conclude that this counter intuitive effect, at odds with most research in this area, is primarily driven by people with high SDO having more negative reactions to immigrants’ willing to abandon their original cultures rather than to immigrants wanting to maintain contact with the host culture. The theoretical implications of these findings are discussed.