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Chris Baerveldt. Social discrimination in high school students’ networks: testing ethnic boundaries and the effects of ethnic composition. Presented at RSS, London 29th of June 2010. Research questions. Do ethnic boundaries exist in schools? Do students socially discriminate?
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Chris Baerveldt Social discrimination inhigh school students’ networks:testingethnicboundariesandtheeffectsof ethnic composition Presented at RSS, London 29th of June 2010.
Research questions • Do ethnic boundaries exist in schools? • Do students socially discriminate? • What is the effect of ethnic composition in school and neighbourhood on social discrimination?
Social discrimination? • Ethnic boundaries = Friendship choices when available: • Caused by inclinations/preferences • Therefore, controlling for other causes • Gender, age, importance school friends, network effects # intra ethnic friendships # inter ethnic friendships > # intra ethnic dyads # inter ethnic dyads
Flanders (VLO) 34 TSO networks 3rd year random selection 1010 students age 14-15 best friend network 3rd generation ethno, western Netherlands (DSBS) 19 MAVO networks 4rth year opportunistic selection 1236 students age 15-16 best friend network 2nd generation ethno, homeland Example: data
Who are your best friends in this year of MAVO /TSO? (fill in codes of fellow students, when appropriate) Friendship item in both studies
--> Figure 1 again: A classroom network, defined by friendship ties
Table 1: Friendships at school Source: Baerveldt et al. (2007).
Flanders (VLO) 3rd generation Criteria: Grandmother’s homeland Nationality, language, … Categories Western majority ↔all non western Minority percentage 14% Netherlands (DSBS) 2nd generation Criteria Parents homeland Categories Dutch, 4 ethnic minorities, mixed Minority percentage 37% Measuring ‘ethnicity’
Discrimination by ethnicity, or by gender, or just an effect of reciprocity?
Assessing social discrimination • Effect ethnic similarity on p(friendship) • Controlling for • Competing similarities (gender) • Dependence in relations, like reciprocity • Effects of student characteristics on • Number of nominated friendships • Popularity
Table 5: Composition effects: theory and hypotheses Source: Vermeij, Van Duijn & Baerveldt (2009)
Table 7: Composition effects: hypotheses and results Source: Vermeij, Van Duijn & Baerveldt (2009)
Discussion • Discrimination: no hard feelings, but hard choices. • Theory: new directions? • Contact hyp.: strength of weak ties • Methods: complete networks • Between countries?