Related Experiment Video
Updated: May 18, 2026

Examining Bilingual Language Control Using the Stroop Task
Published on: February 26, 2020
Ethnic concentration in the neighbourhood and majority and minority language: A study of first and second-generation
Miranda Vervoort1, Jaco Dagevos, Henk Flap
1The Netherlands Institute for Social Research, P.O. Box 16164, 2500 BD The Hague, Netherlands; Utrecht University/ICS, P.O. Box 80.140, 3508 TC Utrecht, Netherlands.
Abstract:
Ethnic residential concentration is often found to hamper immigrants' majority language proficiency. However, there are still several gaps in our understanding of the relationship between ethnic concentration and ethnic minorities' language practices. This study examines the extent to which ethnic concentration also constrains immigrants' majority language use, whether contact with natives and co-ethnics mediates these relationships, and whether ethnic concentration relates to second-generation minorities' minority language proficiency. Structural equation models on data for people of Turkish and Moroccan origin living in the Netherlands (N=2163) showed that ethnic concentration is indirectly related to weaker majority language proficiency and less majority language use through contact with natives and co-ethnics. For second-generation minorities, ethnic concentration is related to better minority language proficiency.
Related Concept Videos
Ethnic Identity within a Larger Culture
Surveys
Stereotypes, Prejudice, and Discrimination
In- and Out-Groups
Language and Cognition
Social Identity
