Naturalized citizens make up approximately 10% of eligible voters, however, they vote at a much lower rate than their U.S.-born counterparts. Why are some naturalized citizens more politically incorporated into American society than others?
To answer this question, Mashail Malik – assistant professor at the Department of Government – and William Marble – Director of Data Science at the Program for Opinion Research and Election Studies at the University of Pennsylvania – will examine the political integration of naturalized citizens.
Due to start in September 2024, the project has been awarded $75,000 by the Russell Sage Foundation – one of the oldest American foundations, which was established by Mrs. Margaret Olivia Sage in 1907 for “the improvement of social and living conditions in the United States.” – and the Carnegie Corporation of New York, a philanthropic foundation established by Andrew Carnegie in 1911.
Titled The Political Integration of Foreign-Born Citizens, the project “seeks to understand variation in political incorporation among the naturalized immigrant community in the United States, with a special focus on the role of gender” Mashail commented.
Mashail, who joined the department in 2022, specializes in the political psychology of identity, with a focus on ethnicity, immigration, and internal migration.
With William’s knowledge of survey research methods and data science, the partnership will develop a psychological ownership scale to examine the relationship between a sense of psychological ownership and political engagement and conduct surveys for their study.
Mashail added: “The project came about as a result of extended fieldwork with immigrant communities in New York City. Over the next year, we’ll be running a series of surveys to test the hypotheses that emerged from this fieldwork, and to develop a new scale of immigrant incorporation.
“We expect to have most of the data collected within the year, and to begin writing papers based on the results in 2025.”