Religion und Bildungserfolg im Migrationskontext – Theoretische Argumente,empirische Befunde und offene Fragen

Religion has received extensive attention as a factor influencing immigrants’ integration. This paper examines the role of religion in explaining ethnic educational inequalities in Germany. Due to a general lack of research in this field, the paper provides an overview of existing empirical findings, specifies theoretical arguments on how religious affiliation, belief and participation possibly affect educational achievement among children of immigrants. Using data from the first wave of the “Children of Immigrants Longitudinal Survey in four European Countries” collected in 2010/11 the paper tests key arguments on the influence of religion on the educational attainment among 14-year-old immigrant and non-immigrant students at German schools. Compared to other religious groups, Muslims display lower rates of educational achievement. However, this can be largely explained by their social background and is independent from their levels of individual religiosity. Interestingly, individual religiosity has a positive effect on the educational achievement among Protestant students, whether with or without a migration background.     

Finanzialisierung,Demokratie und Gesellschaft – zehn Jahre nach Beginn der Finanzkrise

This introduction to the special issue—ten years after the collapse of the investment bank Lehman Brothers and the beginning of a worldwide financial, economic, and debt crisis—reflects on the extent to which the economic crisis affected a turning point in society overall. The current state of research into the relationship between financialization, democracy, and social conditions strongly suggests that while the processes of financialization that favored the emergence of a crisis were influenced by the financial crisis, they were not completely reversed. In fact, the financial market regulation, which was changed in response to the crisis, did not exert any modifying pressure in terms of a restructuring of the financial system. An epochal shift in financial market regulation therefore cannot be identified from the steps taken in the reform process. Elseways there is clear evidence that the financial crisis has had a lasting impact on the European integration process, confidence in democracy, and political culture. The financial crisis is therefore likely to be perceived as a historical watershed, mainly due to its impact on societal areas beyond the financial system itself.     

Ideen und Interessen. Zum Verhältnis von Religion und wirtschaftlicher Entwicklung

While concentrating on the rise of modern capitalism, Weber’s seminal studies have little to say about the impact of religions on contemporary economic development. The paper comments about recent approaches to find an answer to the questions Weber left open. If one disregards a priori constructions of culturalist and rational-choice-theories, these approaches end up again in restating the circular relationship between ideas and interests showed already by Weber, albeit clearly with a higher emphasis on interests. However, the author argues that it would be premature to interpret this result simply as a confirmation of Weber’s “disenchantment” thesis. Rather, it goes back to the transformation of the economy itself into an entity that preaches “values”, proclaims “visions” and in this sense develops an affinity to religious movements. The author deepens this view by referring to Marx’ and Polanyi’s interpretation of capitalism as a system of disembedded markets. The disembedding of markets gives rise to a historically new potential of social uncertainty which the actors need to cope with, thereby developing symbolisms showing striking affinities with religious forms. Nevertheless, the analogies between capitalism and religion are limited.     

I. Soziologie und Politik in guter Gesellschaft?

Ohne Zusammenfassung     

Zur Neubestimmung des Verhältnisses von Religion und Moderne

This paper examines whether teachers in german preschools scale down their expectations on children from immigrant families. Data base are 554 children from the longitudinal BiKS-study in the federal countries Bavaria and Hesse in Germany. Teachers’ ratings about the skills and predictions about the time of school enrolment and the graduation of the children at three measurement points (2005, 2006 and 2007) are used to test the hypothesis. The skills of the children in the areas of vocabulary, arithmetic, and basic cognitive abilities as well as the socioeconomic status of parents are controlled using Propensity-Score-Matching estimations. Nearly no evidence of reduced expectations towards immigrant children is found similar to studies on the transition from primary to secondary school. Inequality reinforcing effects caused by teachers in German preschools are not confirmed.     

Mixed Methods – Stand der Debatte und aktuelle Problemlagen

While mixed methods research is already much advanced and institutionalized in textbooks, handbooks and its own journal on an international level, the German-language debate on mixed methods lags behind. Thus, this introductory paper starts with outlining the history and key concepts of mixed methods designs as well as the current state of the international debate. Next, we explain the aims and concept of this special issue as well as the crucial arguments of the single papers in the overall context of the special issues. Namely, the debate in this special issue of the Kölner Zeitschrift für Soziologie und Sozialpsychologie circles around the following four topics: philosophical, methodological and methodical foundations of mixed methods research; mixed methods designs and mixed methods sampling; modes of combining data and issues of validity; and process-oriented analysis, longitudinal analysis and evaluation. Based on the observations that, firstly, both the international social science research community and social problems are globalizing and, secondly, that social research itself is changing, especially by the increasing relevance of social media and big data, the paper concludes with suggestions for future research.     

Interkulturelle Arbeit und Kommunikation – Gibt es das?

The concept of intercultural communication seems to be a meaningless concept, because it does not point out a specific difference between intercultural and other kinds of communication. Yet its general use makes sense because it helps to become aware that, figuratively speaking, every attempt to communicate is a journey into an unknown foreign country where people like us, are just living in very different way than we are. The concept of intercultural communication is a reminder that every communication is a meeting between two or more equally valuable unknown cultures. Because they are so different, unknown and equally valuable, they first have to respectfully get acquainted with each other, which is not easy, because they only can see each other with their own cultural concepts. Therefore communication is very unlikely to be successful.     

Mitarbeiterintegration und Mitarbeiterbindung von Organisationen – Wie integrieren und binden Organisationen ihr Personal?

This article in the journal “Gruppe. Interaktion. Organisation. Zeitschrift für Angewandte Organisationspsychologie (GIO)” provides a brief overview of a semantic integration mechanism how organizations can succeed in integrating and attach their employees. Every organization has basic assumptions about human behavior. These assumptions or images about people, whether implicitly present or explicitly reflected, essentially determine the behavior of the organization and its personnel management. In terms of research theory, the work is based on the system theoretical considerations of Niklas Luhmann. Organizations are fictitious units that are constructed in communication. The employees of organizations belong to the environment of the organization and are structurally linked to it through their employee role. Structurally coupled means the members of an organization are able to influence the structure of the organization. The central result of this article is the identification of a semantic integration mechanism that functions as a membrane that generates resonance both in the social system of organizations and in the psychological system of structurally coupled employees. In the current changing world of work, this mechanism can help organizations to attach their employees to the organization. The empirical data come from a research project on the identity and functional logic of training organizations.     

Teamarbeit und Gesundheit – Der Einfluss von Teammerkmalen auf Stressbewältigung und Gesundheit bei Un- und Angelernten

To date, research on teamwork and health is sparse. This accounts for teams with low-qualified workers in particular. In this paper a work psychological model for resource and stress management in teams and a study with teams of low-qualified workers are presented (N?=?265 in 33 teams). Results of multi-level analyses show, that team resources in the social work system and understaffing in teams as a team stressor have significant influence on collective coping and explain team differences. Further, team resources in the technical work system, i.e. the quality of teamwork design have significant influence on psychosomatic complaints. These influences go beyond the influences of socio-demographic variables and individual job stressors and job resources.     

Agilität und Organisationsentwicklung – Ziemlich beste Freunde?

Gruppe. Interaktion. Organisation. Zeitschrift für Angewandte Organisationspsychologie (GIO) - Mit Wandel umzugehen ist seit jeher eine zentrale Herausforderung der Unternehmensführung....     

Arbeitsteilung,Berufsorientierung und Partnerschaftsstabilität – Ehen und nichteheliche Lebensgemeinschaften im Vergleich*

The central finding of this paper is that the link between the division of labour and the risk of separation differs depending on the type of relationship. Marriages tend to be destabilised by the wife’s participation in the labour force and stabilised by the traditional division of labour. Empirical evidence of this is manifest in a positive effect of the wife’s income and a negative effect of the husband’s relative income on the likelihood of separation. In contrast to this, unmarried long-term relationships are stabilised by egalitarian division of labour. This is evident from the absence of negative effects of an employment of the female cohabiter on stability of relationship. Furthermore, in unmarried cohabitations the relative income of the man increases the risk of a separation. In addition to the income ratio, homogamous attitudes have explanatory value. Cohabitations are stable when both partners are career-oriented. This finding points to an egalitarian gender-role-orientation among unmarried men. It also implies that an egalitarian orientation has an impact on the living arrangement which needs to be accepted by both partners – for instance when family planning and timing of marriage are concerned.     

Islam in Europa – Integration durch Recht und ihre Grenzen

The integration of Islam has largely occurred through independent legal systems. This article follows some waymarks and recurrent conflicts in this process, compares an individual rights and corporate recognition path of legal integration with respect to their possibilities and limits; and points to tensions between law and politics that result from extended legal integration. What stands out is the elasticity of legal institutions toward a religion that in no small measure must be an irritation to them.     

Deutsch-polnisches Training: Persönliche und professionelle Erfahrungen mit Bikulturalität und Interkulturalität – Anspruch und Wirklichkeit

This report contains several experiences and authentic examples taken from highly professional German-Polish and Polish-German coaching groups. Accordingly, ideas are in part presented from a very personal point of view. Running “Intercultural activities” is very much praised in a world that becomes more and more globalized. But how do these activities work out in practice? The author’s goal is to explain the cultural differences in order for managers to be able to work effectively in international projects. The author illustrates her method and her goals by giving characteristic examples. She talks about demands as far as the personality of the coach is concerned, as well as about interferences within the coaching situation. A prevailing common culture in Europe does not (yet) exist which makes it even more important to talk about differences openly so that they can be understood and be overcome. Useful experiences are shared which shall help to build a ‘working’ trust level between representatives of different cultures. Cultural factors of power usage are described which show how power can be applied in different ways. The influence of language problems is also analyzed in detail. Finally, this paper shows that the most important is to keep an atmosphere based on cooperation: only when such an atmosphere is accepted as a natural daily routine can contacts among participants of different cultures be established as among equals and it is then possible to overcome the challenges related to differences of cultures.     

Entscheidung unter Unsicherheit – Familiengründung und -erweiterung im Erwerbsverlauf

The current investigation analyses the impact of income and economic uncertainty on women’s family formation and expansion. Analyses based on the data of the German Socio-economic Panel reveal that partner income and income security have positive effects on the propensity toward family formation. Conversely, downward mobility in the partner’s career inhibits second birth transitions. Partner resources could be interpreted as social capital facilitating the realisation of the desire for children. Furthermore, the investigation shows that only persistent occupational uncertainty has negative effects on first birth transitions valid equally for men and women. Consequently, results suggest that women are not backtracking from the labour market in reaction to experiences of uncertainty and exclusion. This indicates that women’s occupational establishment is an important condition of family formation. In conclusion, the analysis documents that individual economic und social situation rather than potential economic incalculabilities associated with higher unemployment rates.     

Online-Befragungen im Kontext von Lehrevaluationen – praktisch und unzuverlässig

Online-surveys enjoy increasing popularity and they seem to be especially suited for evaluating the quality of teaching in academic courses. The fact remains, however, that the reliability of their results has hardly been tested. Compared to the results of a written questionnaire carried out with the same university-courses online-surveys demonstrate grave deficiencies. These imperfections render their results useless: 1. Students’ participation in the onlinequestioning is—compared to their participation in the written questionnaire—considerably lower (in several courses too low to be of any analytical use). 2. In the case of all courses and analysed questions the results diverge from those of the written questionnaire which achieved census-quality. Rankings based on these two proceedings differ widely. This occurs regardless of them being set up in individual lists or in groupings. 3. There are clear indications that the way respondents answer online-questionnaires is less reliable than in paper&pencil methods. Although online-surveys benefit by being cost-efficient their methodological shortcomings raise important questions about their reliability for judging the quality of academic teaching.