The dynamics of discrimination, resilience, and social support in the mental health of migrants with and without citizenship

Abstract

Perceived discrimination has a significant negative impact on indices of mental health. One potential buffering factor in this is psychological resilience, which encompasses the ability to recover from or adapt successfully to adversity and use coping strategies, such as positive reappraisal of adverse events. This study examines the role of resilience as well as social support in buffering these effects in groups of migrants both with and without local residence permits. We conducted a non-experimental observational study with a cross-sectional design, collecting a variety of health variables in migrant groups in a naturalistic setting, during the COVID-19 period. The total sample consisted of 201 subjects, 88 of whom had a German residence title and 113 did not. These two groups were compared on the following variables of interest: social support, resilience, discrimination, and general mental health. There was no evidence for a difference in mental health between migrants with and without citizenship. However, our results suggested that migrants without citizenship reported less social support, less resilience, and more discrimination, which continued to have a distinct effect on mental health beyond resilience and social support. Psychological resilience mediated the link between social support and mental health, as well as being related to the perception of discrimination in the migrant group without citizenship. In conclusion, our models of migrants with and without citizenship showed that resilience specifically directly affected perceived discrimination in those without citizenship. The high levels of discrimination and lack of social support, particularly in the migrant group without citizenship, are concerning and suggest a focus for future interventions.

Keywords:

• Resilience
• discrimination
• migrant
• citizenship
• social support

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Author contributions

MM: design, data-collection, analysis, manuscript writing and editing. JKM: design, analysis supervision, manuscript writing and editing. GÖ: design, data-collection, drafting and writing of manuscript and editing subsequent versions. RN: design, data-collection, critical revision of manuscript. SA: design, data-collection, critical revision of manuscript. S-JH design, data-collection, critical revision of manuscript. MSO: design, data-collection, manuscript writing and editing.