The adaptation of immigrants from Russia to Finland
The seminar on theme “INPRES project: The adaptation of immigrants from Russia to Finland” was held on 26 April in the ILSCR. The lecturers were Inga Jasinskaja-Lahti, associate professor in Social Psychology, and Tuuli Anna Mähönen, substitute university lecturer in Social Psychology (the department of Social Research, University of Helsinki).
The seminar on theme “INPRES project: The adaptation of immigrants from Russia to Finland” was held on 26 April in the ILSCR. The lecturers were Inga Jasinskaja-Lahti, associate professor in Social Psychology, and Tuuli Anna Mähönen, substitute university lecturer in Social Psychology (the department of Social Research, University of Helsinki).
The main objective of the INPRES project (“Intervening at the pre-migration stage: Providing tools for promoting integration and adaptation throughout the migration process”) is to provide knowledge on the complexity and dynamics of immigrant acculturation and adaptation starting from the pre-acculturation phase. It was 4-wave longitudinal study (1 pre-migration and 3 post-migration assessments; survey + focus group interviews) conducted in 2008-2011.
Immigrants in Finland compose 3% of the total population. The biggest groups are Russians and Ingrian-Finns, and Estonians. 15 000 people were registered as future migrants from Russia to Finland in 2008.
The sample consisted of 352 respondents (incl. 224 Ingrian-Finns) on pre-migration stage (8-14 months before migration), 227 (158 Ingrian-Finns) 1 year after migration (short-term adaptation) and 194 (136 Ingrian-Finns) 2 years after migration (long-term adaptation). Migration motivations were personal development (work, education, opportunities for children, new experiences), coming home (back to one’s roots) and insecurity in Russia (economic and societal insecurity). Satisfaction with life 1 year after migration significantly increased, satisfaction with the migration decision slightly grew too; stressfulness of migration significantly decreased whereas, predictably, perceived ethnic discrimination slightly increased and socio-cultural adaptation slightly decreased. In whole, the life for immigrants became better, despite some negative attitudes towards them from the majority population, and they didn’t regret for their decision of moving to Finland.
Olga Pavlenko