Background and Methodology
This survey was conducted by Dr Sue Watt (University of New England) together with Settlement Services International, and with the support of Armidale Regional Council. It is the second of three surveys tracking Armidale community attitudes towards refugees settling in Armidale, enabling stakeholders to understand and respond to issues as they arise.
Following the announcement that Armidale was to be a new refugee settlement area with 200-300 refugees arriving during 2018, there was a strong positive community response, with offers of donations and many people volunteering their time to help. However, attitudes were not uniformly positive, and some negative opinions were expressed. The community monitoring study allows us to accurately assess how different segments of the community are feeling about, and responding to, the arrival of refugees.
To date, two surveys have been conducted. A Baseline survey was conducted in April 2018, and Survey 2 was then conducted in September 2018. At the time of the Baseline survey, the first Yazidi families (around 30 individuals) had recently arrived in Armidale but were not yet very visible in the community. By September, around 170 Yazidi refugees had arrived in Armidale. They could readily be seen in the community as they went about their daily activities. However, as they were still learning the language and orienting themselves to Australian ways, they had not yet started mixing very much with the community.
Both surveys sampled 200 community members via a random dialling telephone survey. Quotas were set for age and gender, and a representative sample was obtained. There was high participation in the study, with just over 90% of people contacted in both surveys agreeing to the telephone interview. The survey included some questions from the Mapping Social Cohesion (led by the Scanlon Foundation and Monash University) which, since 2007, has conducted an annual survey charting Australian public opinion on social cohesion, immigration and population issues. This allowed comparison between Armidale and other regional areas of Australia on these items.
Findings
Overall attitudes about the refugees coming to Armidale were positive, with the average in both surveys coming to 68/100. These attitudes did not change from the Baseline survey to Survey 2, with attitudes remaining equally positive. There was, of course, diversity in these attitudes. Here, we report on that diversity.
Audience segmentation
Cluster analysis of the Baseline survey revealed that the Armidale community could be divided into four groups based on their responses to the refugees coming to Armidale. We have labelled these (i) Enthusiastic, (ii) Positive, (iii) Concerned, and (iv) Assimilationist.
The “Enthusiastic” group were very positive about the refugees coming. They were highly educated, idealistic, keen for cultural exchange, and would enjoy contact with the refugees. Compared with the other clusters, they were more likely to come from a diverse background themselves. They would like Armidale to have a higher refugee intake. They were especially keen for the refugees to bring cultural diversity to Armidale, but expressed some worries around whether the community would accept them and whether they would integrate.
The “Positive” group were also very positive about the refugees coming to Armidale. These people saw benefits for Armidale in their arrival, they thought the number of refugees coming was about right, were keen for intercultural contact and would enjoy contact with the refugees. They expressed some concern about whether there will be enough support services for the refugees and whether there are enough jobs for them.
Together, the “Enthusiastic” and “Positive” groups formed the majority of Armidale residents.
The “Concerned” group were less positive about the refugees coming to Armidale. They thought that the intake was too high, and expressed concern that there may not be enough jobs for the refugees. This group had completed less education than the other groups (38% were educated to Year 10 or below) and their financial status was more often described as “Just getting along.” It is possible that they felt competition with the refugees for jobs. They greatly underestimated how positive Armidale’s attitudes towards the refugees are, rating them as 38/100. This group was not particularly averse to other cultures and may enjoy intercultural days, which might help to adjust their under-estimate of community attitudes by showing them the community’s overall positive response to the refugees.
The “Assimilationist” group were similar to the “Concerned” group in that they had less positive attitudes regarding the refugees coming to Armidale. They were of a similar age to the other groups but had been in Armidale the longest (average = 38 years). They tended to have a technical education, and very few came from a migrant background themselves. This group showed little interest in other cultures and would prefer the refugees to assimilate quickly. Consistent with this, members of this group tended to worry that the refugees may not integrate into Australian society or accept Australian ways.
Together, the “Concerned” and “Assimilationist” groups formed the minority of Armidale residents.
Cluster analysis was repeated in Survey 2, and similar clusters were present to those found in the Baseline survey. “Enthusiastic” was the largest group, and together “Enthusiastic” and “Positive” formed the majority, but by a smaller margin than at Baseline. This is probably due to changes in how the clusters were defined rather than to shifting attitudes, which showed little change.
Changes from Baseline
We tested for changes from Baseline to Survey 2. The following statistically significant (i.e., non-random) changes were found:
- Concern about jobs. While jobs remained the most frequently mentioned concern, the intensity of concern around this issue was reduced in Survey 2.
- Willingness to volunteer time to help refugees. Survey 2 participants showed significantly less willingness to volunteer time to help refugees than Baseline participants.
- Years in Armidale. Survey 2 participants had spent significantly fewer years in Armidale than Baseline participants. This could reflect a slightly different sampling strategy used by the telephone survey company.
- Reasons for respondents’ rating of the question “Do you have any concerns about the impact of refugees coming to Armidale?” (some people indicated no concern at all):
- A new reason was “Armidale has the capacity to take them.”
- There were many generic positive responses, such as “They are good people.”
- Some people mentioned their positive experiences with the refugees.
- A small number mentioned that the refugees could bring crime.
- Some people said that the number of refugees arriving is too many.
Additional Findings from Survey 2
Survey 2 asked about contact with the refugees. This wasn’t included in the Baseline survey, as the refugees had only just arrived. Forty-one per cent of participants in Survey 2 reported that they had experienced contact with the refugees arriving in Armidale this year; on average the contact was rated as “quite positive.” Only 3 people (4.8% of those who had contact) reported negative experiences. It will be of interest to see how this develops by Survey 3 with the increasing presence of the refugees in the Armidale community.
Finally, it is noteworthy that, in both surveys, participants rated other people’s attitudes lower than the community average showed (51/100, whereas the average was actually 68/100). This was exaggerated among people with negative attitudes, such that they perceived the community as being negative towards the refugees, whereas the community was, and continues to be, on average, positive towards the settlement of refugees in Armidale.
We are conducting the surveys at 4-6 monthly intervals. Each will draw a new sample of 200 Armidale residents and monitor how attitudes develop with increasing presence of refugees in the community.
Comparison with other regional areas of Australia
The survey included questions from the Mapping Social Cohesion survey which has been conducted each year since 2007. This allowed comparison between Armidale and similar regional areas (classified as “Inner Regional Australia”) on these items. The results showed that Armidale was on a par with similar regional areas on almost all indicators, including demographics such as age, sex, level of education, and also indicators of level of discrimination, multiculturalism and acceptance of migration. In terms of differences, compared with other regional areas, Armidale respondents:
- Had a higher sense of belonging in Australia;
- Were more interested in learning about other ethnic groups in Australia;
- Felt slightly more prosperous than similar regional areas in Australia;
- Reported less friendly neighbourhoods.[1]
[1] Compared with Inner Regional Australia, Armidale respondents rated the following questions lower: “People in my local area are willing to help their neighbours”; “My local area is place where people from different national or ethnic backgrounds get on well together”; “I am able to have a real say on issues that are important to me in my local area”.
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