Surveying Minoritized Citizens: A Quantitative Study of Identification Versus Categorization

Abstract

Survey research on minoritized citizens tends to categorize respondents from the top down, instead of allowing for identification from the bottom up. I surveyed 1864 respondents in Germany and the Netherlands, including 401 respondents with a background in Türkiye. I find that those who identify as Turkish often hold significantly different attitudes than those who have a background in Türkiye but who identify as German or Dutch. In fact, those who do not identify as Turkish, hold significantly different attitudes than when a researcher would categorize them as “having a migration background” and/or as “having a migration background in Türkiye.” I provide proof of this with attitudes towards topics often associated with citizens with a migration background. Beyond these empirical advantages to identification over categorization, this paper outlines additional theoretical, methodological and conceptual advantages to following an identification approach in designing surveys.