Political Socialisation in Immigrant Families: Challenging Top-Down Parental Socialisation Models

Research in political science and psychology emphasises the role of parental socialisation in political learning. However, because the children of immigrants living in the United States may have more experience and exposure to US politics than their parents, immigrant children may be a critical source of political information about the US within immigrant families. In addition, parents in immigrant families may be socialising their children to politics within a transnational context. Political socialisation in immigrant families may be a bi-directional process. This paper provides preliminary research on and raises important questions about how political learning takes place in immigrant families.