Anti-Immigrant Sentiment

RM 216

Since the earliest days the United States has been a nation of immigrants. America has experienced different waves of immigration from the colonial era leading up to the present day. From the colonial era through the 19thcentury, most immigrants came from Europe. By the end of the 19thcentury, less immigrants were arriving from Europe and increasing number of immigrants were coming from Asia and Latin America. Despite different countries of origin, the main reason immigrants come to America is for better economic opportunities. The focus of this research is anti-immigration sentiment towards Latinos in America, specifically in today’s political climate. I am interested in examining what factors increase anti-immigration sentiment and what factors trigger attitudes on imposing more restrictive and punitive immigration policies. My research will be guided by sociological theories that examine dominant group hostility towards subordinate or minority groups. This research uses data from the 2014 General Social Survey (GSS), which is a nationally representative sample of non-institutionalized adult Americans. This data set is appropriate for my research since this wave of the GSS includes questions on attitudes towards immigration, patriotism, and various questions on neighborhood context. For the analysis I will use quantitative methods to test my hypotheses. Specifically, I will present descriptive statistics and I will model my two dependent variables using Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) regression analysis.