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Differences in Indicators of Socio-Psychological Integration Between Refugees from Syria and Receiving Community in Croatia

  • Jana Kiralj Lacković EMAIL logo and Dean Ajduković
Published/Copyright: April 26, 2024

Abstract

Socio-psychological integration is a dimension of integration affecting refugees and receiving community members alike, and is related to those integration goals which promote positive intergroup attitudes, close social proximity, interrelation of social networks, low levels of perceived intergroup threat, positive intergroup contact, etc. The goal of this study was to explore the differences in the levels of indicators of socio-psychological integration in both groups. Six hundred receiving community members in Croatia, and 149 refugees from Syria in Croatia participated in the field study. The results generally show that the refugees have more positive attitudes towards receiving community members, a closer social proximity and lower levels of perception of symbolic and realistic intergroup threat than vice-versa. Intergroup contact in Croatia is very rare, posing an interesting setting for the integration process. Potential implications of these findings are discussed.


Corresponding author: Jana Kiralj Lacković, Department of Psychology, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Zagreb, Zagreb, Croatia, E-mail:

Funding source: European Commission

Award Identifier / Grant number: Horizon 2020 Programme for Research and Innovation

  1. Research funding: This study was a part of the international, multidisciplinary research project Forced Displacement and Refugee-Host Community Solidarity (FOCUS) which focused on socio-economic and socio-psychological indicators of integration and the relationship between the dimensions of integration of refugees from Syria in Sweden, Germany, Croatia, and Jordan. It was financed by the European Commission from the Horizon 2020 Programme for Research and Innovation (Grant number 822401).

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Supplementary Material

This article contains supplementary material (https://doi.org/10.1515/humaff-2023-0132).


Received: 2023-12-09
Accepted: 2024-03-26
Published Online: 2024-04-26
Published in Print: 2024-04-25

© 2024 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

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