Parental Influence on Friendships Between Native and Immigrant Adolescents

Abstract

Parental influence on friendships between native (N = 5,683) and immigrant (N = 3,371) adolescents (aged ± 15) was investigated with the CILS4EU data of pupils in German and Dutch school classes (N = 446) and parents. The researchers examined whether parents affect friendships across group boundaries by shaping the structural opportunities to establish out-group friends and their children's out-group attitudes. The results show that if parents have more out-group friends and if they consider it less important to maintain in-group traditions, their children have more out-group friends. Part of this relationship is mediated by children's out-group attitudes. Some evidence is found that the opportunity structure mediates the relationship between parental characteristics and adolescent out-group friendship.