Race, Immigration, and Exogamy among the Native-born: Variation across Communities

Did rising immigration levels change racial and ethnic exogamy patterns for young adults in the United States? Adding local demographics to Qian & Lichter's (2007) national results, we examine the relationship between the size of the local immigrant population in urban and rural areas and U.S.-born individuals' exogamy patterns in heterosexual unions, controlling for the area's racial composition. Using Census 2000 race, ethnicity, and nativity data and log-linear models, we test hypotheses about the relationship between high levels of immigration from Asia and Latin America and endogamy rates for U.S.-born Latino/as and Asians. We find that U.S.-born Latino/as and Asians are not consistently more endogamous in high-immigrant areas once we control for population composition differences across local areas. Surprisingly, U.S.-born Blacks and Native Americans are significantly less endogamous in areas with more immigrants.