Assimilation or integration? A study of Asian adolescents

Summary

This paper describes a research project on the acculturation processes of young people whose parents were migrants from the Indian subcontinent but who have now settled in England: 146 boys and girls from four comprehensive schools completed a questionnaire and an acculturation scale. Following from the published researches by Stopes‐Roe and Cochrane, and Drury, it was hypothesized that girls would show more positive attitudes to the adoption of English norms compared with boys and that Hindu and Sikh young people would score higher on the scale compared with Muslims. Results confirm the hypotheses and the high reliability of the scale. The findings are placed in the wider context of an assimilation‐separation continuum and the implications for the education of Asian young people are explored.

Keywords:

• acculturation
• integration
• biculturalism
• identity
• traditionalism
• religion