School-based Process Indicators and the Development of Youths' Xenophobic Attitudes

Abstract

According to a publication of Baumert, Koller and Schnabel (2000), school tracks in Germany form differential contexts, not only for the development of academic outcomes but also for adolescents' xenophobic attitudes. The present paper tries to clarify whether the development of adolescents' xenophobic attitudes is influenced by 1) different percentages of pupils in classes with a foreign background (cultural-contact hypothesis), 2) different qualities of social relationships within classes (class-climate), 3) different cultural milieus within classes caused by the composition of the classes, and 4) different developmental courses of political knowledge. Cross-sectional as well as longitudinal multi-level analyses were conducted on the basis of a longitudinal data set of the BIJU-study (N = 3062). Although predictive power was low, competitiveness within classes, liberal values at the class-level, and political knowledge turned out to be significant indicators for school-based processes.