Discrimination against ethnic minorities in Germany: Going back to the field

A series of 14 field experiments on the differential treatment of ethnic ma jority and minority groups were conducted. In all studies, German participa nts were confronted with a German or a foreign confederate (ostensibly a me mber of the migrant-worker population or a refugee/asylum seeker). In 9 exp eriments, the foreign confederate received worse treatment than did his Ger man counterpart. Meta-analyses showed a significant overall correlation bet ween ethnic group membership and indexes of discrimination (r =.24), which support the assumption of everyday ethnic discrimination in Germany. Catego rizing studies according to the directness of interaction between confedera te and participants revealed a significantly stronger discrimination in rem ote contact situations (r =.34 vs. r =.17), replicating results of a review on American studies by Crosby, Bromley, and Saxe (1980).