| A humanitarian crisis in immigrant detention and treatment of refugees has been partially created and maintained with the use of immigrant threat narratives in the United States since September 11, 2001. Despite evidence to the contrary, the narrative typically focuses on economic, violent crime and terrorism threats to justify exclusionary immigration policies. The current research represents a cross-sectional study surveying 1,005 U.S. residents seeking to test, contrast and integrate 3 dominant models of anti-immigrant sentiment (AIS). The models include the Group Threat, Cultural and Contact models and includes analyses of terror management mechanisms inspired by the ongoing war on terror's relationship with cultural factors. The study utilized linear regression and correlational analysis testing each model's ability to predict AIS, argues that they represent different levels of analysis and tests interactions of the varying models to construct a more comprehensive approach to AIS. Findings indicate that Group Threat factors' impact is subjective rather than evidence based and predict personality and political traits associated with AIS. On its own, the Cultural model is the strongest predictor of AIS, but interact with Group Threat factors by mediating their impact on AIS. Further, having positive interactions with immigrants was found to moderate the combined effect of Group Threat and Cultural factors lessening their impact on AIS. The findings inform intervention efforts meant to combat the immigrant threat narrative fueling the humanitarian crisis and more evidenced based approaches to immigration policy interventions. |
