How language usage shapes the public acceptance of immigrant assimilation: the case of China

Previous studies have suggested that immigrants using the language of their host country can increase native citizens' support for immigration. However, it is unclear whether the language effect differs in the developing world with limited immigration experience, and the underlying mechanism is also debatable. Incorporating the stereotype content model (SCM), our study proposes that language usage can increase immigrants' perceived warmth and competence, affecting the local public's immigration approval in different ways. We conduct a survey experiment with over 2100 respondents in China by randomly assigning participants to a treatment in which they view a video clip of a Caucasian immigrant speaking English, accented Chinese, or fluent Chinese. Our results show that speaking Chinese increases the public acceptance of an immigrant by 3–5 percentage points, while no significant effect arises between accented and fluent Chinese. Mediation analysis indicates that both assimilationist (cultural) and instrumental (economic) concerns drive the results.