Social Capital and Migration: How do Similar Resources Lead to Divergent Outcomes?

This article investigates how migrant social capital differentially influences individuals 'migration and cumulatively generates divergent outcomes for communities. To combine the fragmented findings in the literature, the article proposes a framework that decomposes migrant social capital into resources (information about or assistance with migration), sources (prior migrants), and recipients (potential migrants). Analysis of multilevel and longitudinal data from 22 rural villages in Thailand shows that the probability of internal migration increases with the available resources, yet the magnitude of increase depends on recipients' characteristics and the strength of their ties to sources. Specifically, individuals become more likely to migrate if migrant social capital resources are greater and more accessible. The diversity of resources by occupation increases the likelihood of migration, while diversity by destination inhibits it. Resources from weakly tied sources, such as village members, have a higher effect on migration than resources from strongly tied sources in the household. Finally, the importance of resources for migration declines with recipients' own migration experience. These findings challenge the mainstream account of migrant social capital as a uniform resource that generates similar migration outcomes for different groups of individuals or in different settings. In Nang Rong villages, depending on the configuration of resources, sources, and recipients, migrant social capital leads to differential migration outcomes for individuals and divergent cumulative migration patterns in communities.     

International Migration and Educational Assortative Mating in Mexico and the United States

This paper examines the relationship between migration and marriage by describing how the distributions of marital statuses and assortative mating patterns vary by individual and community experiences of migration. In Mexico, migrants and those living in areas with high levels of out-migration are more likely to be in heterogamous unions. This is because migration increases the relative attractiveness of single return migrants while disproportionately reducing the number of marriageable men in local marriage markets. In the United States, the odds of homogamy are lower for migrants compared with nonmigrants; however, they do not vary depending on the volume of migration in communities. Migrants are more likely than nonmigrants to “marry up” educationally because the relatively small size of this group compels them to expand their pool of potential spouses to include nonmigrants, who tend to be better educated than they are. Among migrants, the odds of marrying outside of one’s education group increase the most among the least educated. In Mexican communities with high rates of out-migration, the odds of marrying outside of one’s education group are highest among those with the highest level of education. These findings suggest that migration disrupts preferences and opportunities for homogamy by changing social arrangements and normative climates.     

The Effect of Family Member Migration on Education and Work Among Nonmigrant Youth in Mexico

While academic and policy circles have given much attention to the assimilatory experiences of Mexican immigrants in the United States, less is known about those who stay behind—an especially unfortunate oversight given the increasing number of Mexican youth with migrant family members. Of the studies on this topic, most have sought to identify the effect that migration has on youths’ migratory and educational aspirations, often using qualitative methods in individual sending communities. The present article supplements this research in two ways: (1) in addition to assessing educational outcomes, the scope of the analysis is expanded to include nonmigrants’ interaction with another homeland institution of upward mobility: the labor market; and (2) using a large demographic data set, statistical techniques are employed to adjust for unobserved selectivity into the migrant family-member population, thus accounting for a potentially serious source of bias. The results suggest that youth in migrant-sending families are less likely to complete the educational transitions leading up to postsecondary school and have a lower probability of participating in the local economy. The results also indicate that unobserved factors play a “nonignorable” role in sorting youth into migrant and nonmigrant families.     

Engendering migrant networks: The case of Mexican migration

This article compares the impact of family migrant and destination-specific networks on international and internal migration. We find that migrant networks are more important for international moves than for internal moves and that female networks are more important than male networks for moves within Mexico. For moves to the United States, male migrant networks are more important for prospective male migrants than for female migrants, and female migrant networks lower the odds of male migration, but significantly increase female migration. We suggest that distinguishing the gender composition and destination content of migrant networks deepens our understanding of how cumulative causation affects patterns of Mexican migration.     

Sri Lankan female domestic workers overseas: mothering their children from a distance

Sri Lanka is one of three countries in Asia, along with the Philippines and Indonesia, where women migrants constitute between 60 and 70% of legal migrants; these female migrants are mainly employed overseas as domestic workers. Since the 1980s, the out-migration of Sri Lankan females for employment abroad surpassed that of males and the major destination has been countries in the Middle East. The majority of these women are married and have at least one child; they leave their children in the care of other family members in their absence. While they usually make arrangements to accommodate the spatial separation forced by migration, their migration poses many challenges to themselves and their children left behind. Recently, the issue of children left behind by migrant mothers has attracted growing attention from policy makers in Sri Lanka. Since the social and emotional ramifications of mothering from a distance and how these mothers cope with them are inadequately investigated, this article uses data collected from a 2008 survey of 400 Sri Lankan female migrant families to examine the effects of mothers’ migration on how they are mothering their children from a distance, and how they perceive the effects on their children. The article concludes with some suggested policy recommendations.     

Networks Matter: Male Mexican Migrants’ Use of Hospitals

Using the behavioral model for health care use and unique data from the Mexican migration project, we explore the factors associated with hospital use among Mexican male migrants to the US. Twenty-eight percent of the respondents reported receiving healthcare from a hospital. In addition to established enabling factors of time in the US and English language ability, this research points to the importance of family social networks as enabling hospital health care use among migrants. Migrants with more ties to family members with migration experience have an increased likelihood of using emergency room healthcare. The research adds to the body of literature by providing evidence that ties to individuals with US migration experience increases migrants’ probability of accessing healthcare at hospitals.     

Household migration as a livelihood adaptation in response to a natural disaster: Nicaragua and Hurricane Mitch

This study uses data drawn from the Nicaragua Living Standards and Measurement Study Survey to examine international livelihood migrations from Nicaragua in the years surrounding the rapid-onset Hurricane Mitch event of 1998. The likelihood of an international livelihood migration occurring between the years 1996 and 2001 is modeled utilizing discrete-time event history analysis. While findings indicate no influence of Hurricane Mitch on likelihood of livelihood migration, the Mitch event is associated with increased migrant selectivity according to past household migration experience for migrations to Costa Rica, suggesting these migrations to be livelihood adaptations of those with high capability in the form of access to migrant social networks. In addition, the Mitch event is found to be associated with decreased likelihood of migration by small business owners. This finding is interpreted as reflecting business owning households choosing to forego sending migrants to instead have ‘all hands on deck’ to assist with business operations.     

Urbanization and the fertility transition in Ghana

This paper examines the way in which migration and urban residence operate to alter fertility outcomes. While urban-rural fertility differentials have long been established for most developing societies, the nature of these differences among migrants and between migrants and those of succeeding generations is not well understood. The evidence presented here suggests that rural-urban migration and urbanization may contribute positively to processes of fertility transition. Using data from the 1998 Kumasi Peri-Urban Survey, which included a 5-year retrospective monthly calendar of childbearing, we suggest that migrants adapt quickly to an urban environment. Our results also reveal generational differences in recent and cumulative fertility. While migrants exhibit higher cumulative fertility than urban residents of the second and third generation, their fertility is significantly lower than rural averages in Ghana. Children of migrants exhibit childbearing patterns quite similar to those in higher-order generations. Most noteworthy is the nature of the disparities in childbearing patterns between migrants and the succeeding generations. Migrant women have higher lifetime fertility than urban natives. Migrant women also exhibit higher fertility over the last 5 years than second generation or high-order urban natives. But these first generation women exhibit lower fertility (vs. urban natives) for the year immediately prior to the survey. These patterns lend support to an interpretation that combines rather than opposes theories of selectivity, disruption, adaptation and socialization. We conclude by discussing mechanisms that might explain these interrelated processes of fertility adjustment and suggest that policies discouraging rural-urban migration need to be revisited.     

Ecological Analyses of Permanent and Temporary Migration Streams in China in the 1990s

Using data from China’s Fifth National Census of 2000, we analyze the dynamics of China’s inter-provincial permanent and temporary migration streams for the 1995–2000 period. The permanent and temporary migration streams are shown to have similar patterns, but the volume of the temporary migration streams greatly outnumbers that of the permanent streams. A human ecological model of migration is proposed and tested, and its results are compared with those of a gravity model of migration. Of the various ecological variables examined in the models, investment levels at destination, and being a coastal province at destination, all have strong effects on migration. The effects of the independent variables are more similar than different with regard to predicting the permanent and the temporary migration streams.     

Dual-earner migration. Earnings gains, employment and self-selection

This paper examines how spouses in dual-earner couples weigh each partner’s expected wage growth in the decision to migrate. Previous research suggests that husbands’ job prospects dominate the migration choice irrespective of their relative earnings potential. Based on British panel data, this paper employs an endogenous switching model and estimates wage differentials of migrating vs. staying for husbands and wives corrected for double selectivity of migration and employment. Dual-earner couples attach a positive weight to each partner’s expected wage gains when deciding to migrate. Moreover, migrant wives’ employment decreases temporarily, and there are significant selection effects in migration and employment amongst non-migrants.     

Exploring Child Mortality Risks Associated with Diverse Patterns of Maternal Migration in Haiti

Internal migration is a salient dimension of adulthood in Haiti, particularly among women. Despite the high prevalence of migration in Haiti, it remains unknown whether Haitian women’s diverse patterns of migration influence their children’s health and survival. In this paper, we introduce the concept of lateral (i.e., rural-to-rural, urban-to-urban) versus nonlateral (i.e., rural-to-urban, urban-to-rural) migration to describe how some patterns of mothers’ internal migration may be associated with particularly high mortality among children. We use the 2006 Haitian Demographic and Health Survey to estimate a series of discrete-time hazard models among 7,409 rural children and 3,864 urban children. We find that compared with their peers with nonmigrant mothers, children born to lateral migrants generally experience lower mortality, whereas those born to nonlateral migrants generally experience higher mortality. Although there are important distinctions across Haiti’s rural and urban contexts, these associations remain net of socioeconomic factors, suggesting they are not entirely attributable to migrant selection. Considering the timing of maternal migration uncovers even more variation in the child health implications of maternal migration; however, the results counter the standard disruption and adaptation perspective. Although future work is needed to identify the processes underlying the differential risk of child mortality across lateral versus nonlateral migrants, the study demonstrates that looking beyond rural-to-urban migration and considering the timing of maternal migration can provide a fuller, more complex understanding of migration’s association with child health.     

Migradollars and mortality: The effects of migration on infant survival in Mexico

We apply multilevel methods to data from Mexico to examine how village migration patterns affect infant survival outcomes in origins. We argue that migration is a cumulative process with varying health effects at different stages of its progression, and test several related hypotheses. Findings suggest higher rates of infant mortality in communities experiencing intense U.S. migration. However, two factors diminish the disruptive effects of migration: migradollars, or migrant remittances to villages, and the institutionalization of migration over time. Mortality risks are low when remittances are high and decrease as migration becomes increasingly salient to livelihoods of communities. Together, the findings indicate eventual benefits to all infants, irrespective of household migration experience, as a result of the development of social and economic processes related to U.S. migration.     

The effects of migrant remittances on population–environment dynamics in migrant origin areas: international migration, fertility, and consumption in highland Guatemala

International migration impacts origin regions in many ways. As examples, remittances from distant migrants may alter consumption patterns within sending communities, while exposure to different cultural norms may alter other behaviors. This paper combines these insights to offer a unique lens on migration’s environmental impact. From an environmental perspective, we ask the following question: is the likely rise in consumption brought about by remittances counterbalanced by a reduction in fertility in migrant households following exposure to lower fertility cultures? Based on ethnographic case studies in two western highland Guatemalan communities, we argue that the near-term rise in consumption due to remittances is not counterbalanced by rapid decline in migrant household fertility. However, over time, the environmental cost of consumption may be mitigated at the community level through diffusion of contraception and family planning norms yielding lower family size.     

Men’s Migration and Women’s Fertility in Rural Mozambique

Labor migration profoundly affects households throughout rural Africa. This study looks at how men’s labor migration influences marital fertility in a context where such migration has been massive while its economic returns are increasingly uncertain. Using data from a survey of married women in southern Mozambique, we start with an event-history analysis of birth rates among women married to migrants and those married to nonmigrants. The model detects a lower birth rate among migrants’ wives, which tends to be partially compensated for by an increased birth rate upon cessation of migration. An analysis of women’s lifetime fertility shows that it decreases as the time spent in migration by their husbands accrues. When we compare reproductive intentions stated by respondents with migrant and nonmigrant husbands, we find that migrants’ wives are more likely to want another child regardless of the number of living children, but the difference is significant only for women who see migration as economically benefiting their households. Yet, such women are also significantly more likely to use modern contraception than other women. We interpret these results in light of the debate on enhancing versus disrupting effects of labor migration on families and households in contemporary developing settings.     

Economic Migration and Happiness: Comparing Immigrants’ and Natives’ Happiness Gains From Income

Research on happiness casts doubt on the notion that increases in income generally bring greater happiness. This finding can be taken to imply that economic migration might fail to result in increased happiness for the migrants: migration as a means of increasing one’s income might be no more effective in raising happiness than other means of increasing one’s income. This implication is counterintuitive: it suggests that migrants are mistaken in believing that economic migration is a path to improving one’s well-being, at least to the extent that well-being means (or includes) happiness. This paper considers a scenario in which it is less likely that migrants are simply mistaken in this regard. The finding that increased incomes do not lead to greater happiness is an average (non)effect—and migrants might be exceptional in this regard, gaining happiness from increased incomes to a greater extent than most people. The analysis here, using data from the World Values Survey, finds that the association between income and happiness is indeed stronger for immigrants in the USA than for natives—but even for immigrants that association is still relatively weak. The discussion then considers this finding in light of the fact that immigrants also report lower levels of happiness than natives after controlling for other variables.     

Migration Processes,Familial Characteristics,and Schooling Dropout Among Black Youths

This study uses data from the 2000 U.S. census to examine whether the schooling advantage of black immigrants’ children found in previous studies is robust. According to the results, the advantage associated with having migrant parents is not restricted to the children of immigrants. Black migrant parents, regardless of foreign-born status, have children with favorable schooling outcomes. Such parental-level influences, however, seem stronger among some immigrant groups than among native internal migrants. The study also suggests that the collective advantage of the children of immigrants is driven by positive migrant selectivity. Accordingly, comparisons between the children of native migrants and children in various immigrant groups reveal that the immigrant advantage is not robust. In fact, the results suggest that when immigrant ethnicity is considered, some children of immigrants may be disadvantaged relative to the children of native migrants. Among recent migrants, the children of native internal migrants also have more favorable outcomes than the children of immigrants, although these differences disappear after background factors are controlled. Further, internal-migrant and immigrant households are less likely to have characteristics that adversely affect schooling than nonmigrant households. Unsurprisingly, the children of nonmigrants have the worst outcomes among black youths.     

The Effects of Children’s Migration on Elderly Kin’s Health: A Counterfactual Approach

Recent studies of migration and the left-behind have found that elders with migrant children actually experience better health outcomes than those with no migrant children, yet these studies raise many concerns about self-selection. Using three rounds of panel survey data from the Indonesian Family Life Survey, we employ the counterfactual framework developed by Rosenbaum and Rubin to examine the relationship between having a migrant child and the health of elders aged 50 and older, as measured by activities of daily living (ADL), self-rated health (SRH), and mortality. As in earlier studies, we find a positive association between old-age health and children’s migration, an effect that is partly explained by an individual’s propensity to have migrant children. Positive impacts of migration are much greater among elders with a high propensity to have migrant children than among those with low propensity. We note that migration is one of the single greatest sources of health disparity among the elders in our study population, and point to the need for research and policy aimed at broadening the benefits of migration to better improve health systems rather than individual health.     

Insect migration: Variability and success in a capricious environment

Stochastic effects of climate and weather have a pervasive influence on the induction, performance and evolution of migration. In wing-dimorphic species, their influence on habitat quality, and on rates of development of the migrant itself, maintains variation in responses to environmental cues determining wing-form and migratory behaviour. Migrants flying above their flight boundary layer rely on winds to disperse them across landscapes in which their habitats are distributed. Patterns of distribution of habitat patches, and the influence of changing windspeeds and direction on the displacements of migrants, result in selection for variation in migratory potential at each migration. In subsequent migrations, this variation and stochastic effects of the winds on groundtracks of individual migrants ensure that their destinations ‘sample’ the landscapes they travel over. The extent and resolution of this sampling, by which migrants reach favourable habitats, depend on the components of migratory potential, their mode of inheritance, and genetic correlations between them, as well as on the characteristics of the winds on which they travel.     

Mother’s,Household, and Community U.S. Migration Experience and Infant Mortality in Rural and Urban Mexico

This study explores rural and urban differences in the relationship between U.S. migration experience measured at the individual, household, and community levels and individual-level infant mortality outcomes in a national sample of recent births in Mexico. Using 2000 Mexican Census data and multi-level regression models, we find that women’s own U.S. migration experience is associated with lower odds of infant mortality in both rural and urban Mexico, possibly reflecting a process of healthy migrant selectivity. Household migration has mixed blessings for infant health in rural places: remittances are beneficial for infant survival, but recent out-migration is disruptive. Recent community-level migration experience is not significantly associated with infant mortality overall, although in rural places, there is some evidence that higher levels of community migration are associated with lower infant mortality. Household- and community-level migration have no relationship with infant mortality in urban places. Thus, international migration is associated with infant outcomes in Mexico in fairly complex ways, and the relationships are expressed most profoundly in rural areas of Mexico.