Why People Might Not Like Asylum Seekers? Essay Example

With the development of globalisation, free movement of capital was accompanied by free movement of labour and stimulation of migration processes. Irrespective of relative positive influence of migration on competition of labour force and subsequent improvement of working skills and work delivered, the cultural perception of the phenomenon is quite problematic and still arguable. In some societies newcomers are able to assimilate and are accepted relatively easy, while, in others, the process might take not only years but decades. This is particularly characteristic for the societies with traditional values and conservative overview. It is particularly interesting to find out what causes the negative attitude to asylum seekers in the most conservative country of the world – the United Kingdom. In order understand the issue better, official survey on the topic was conducted in the framework of the general British Electoral Study of 2005. The data from this study is going to be the main material for analysis.

The frequency chart describes quite interesting picture of the studied issue. First of all, it can be summarised that general attitude towards asylum seekers is rather negative than positive. In this context, 47.9% strongly agree and agree that asylum seekers should be sent back home immediately are supported by 23.6% of ignorant people who simply do not care about the issue at all. In this case, the ignorance can be viewed as negative phenomenon mainly because it does not contribute to support of the asylum seekers that are supported only by 20.8 % and strongly supported by 7.6% of the respondents viewed in 712 observations.

Further data of cross-tabulation (expressed in percentage frequency) explains the tendency of negative attitude towards asylum seekers in respect to the time when respondents finished their school. In this context, the connection is made between intelligence and general overview of respondents and their perception of aliens. In this context, main findings showed that the earlier people completed school the likelier they were to have negative perception of asylum seekers. 75.6% of 21.2% who were strongly negative about asylum seekers belonged to the group that finished their education between 15 and 17. Only 16.2% of respondents belonging to the aforementioned group of 15-17 considered that asylum seekers should not leave the country.

One of the most interesting things in the given statistical data is the variable n, which corresponds to the number of observations conducted during a specific study. In this case it corresponds to the number of people observed. Meaning of this variable in the context of percentage frequency is that through the general formula, the frequency can be derived. In its turn, this will give the study a more general and comprehensible meaning. In this context, frequency equals percentage frequency multiplied by number of observations and divided by 100 percent. Applying this formula to each group or respondents, the following data can be retrieved: 190 of all respondents agreed that asylum seekers should return home immediately, 168 were ignorant, 151 had strong negative attitude to asylum seekers, they were followed by 148 respondents who had positive attitude to the issue and only 54 individuals had very positive attitude to the question. In case of further need, this data can be transformed into equivalents for thousands of people, taking into account the mentioned above probability of errors being less than 1 for 100 cases.

The meaning of people’s attitude towards asylum seekers is significant in the context of their attitude to the immigrants in general. In this context, the correlation between negative attitude towards asylum seekers and towards immigrants in general is in linear dependence. This means people who do not like asylum seekers are likely to have the same attitude towards immigrants. This statement is explained by the correlation’s direction which is approaching towards 1. At the point when correlation equals 1, this means that two variables are entirely interconnected and interdependent; whereas, at the point of zero, two variables have no mutual dependence and, at the point of -1, two variables have nonlinear interconnection. In case of this study, if correlation coefficient was – 0.551, this would mean that people who do not like asylum seekers are likely to prefer immigrants, which is not the case of this study.

In the context of all above mentioned, it is relevant to find out which variables affect attitudes towards asylum seekers the most. From the given table it can be concluded that although according to gradation of standardisation the variables of age of leaving school and sex would have the greatest influence on the target issue. On the other hand, from the point of significance, the greatest influence would have age, income and sex variables. Using cross-evaluation of both gradation of standardised coefficients and significance would be sex, income, age and only then the age of living school. These conclusions are derived from the statement that the greatest value is of the variable changing towards direction of 1.

In the context of regression and influence of variables on the target issue, the meaning of R² is of specific importance. In this case, the closer the number describing the R² to 1, the higher is variability that a certain factor can be explained through another one and their interconnection. In other words, the fact that R² is only 0.073, means that probable interconnection and mutual influence of independent variables on the target issue is possible only in 7.3%. This basically shows very little probability. Overall, it can be concluded that although certain connection between age of school completion and attitude to asylum seekers and immigrants can be derived, in the context of strict statistical regression, the connection between various independent variables proved to be quite low.