Research & Publications

Immigrants constitute 14% of the U.S. population, the U.S. currently houses the largest immigrant population in the world, and more than 1 in 4 Americans identify as immigrants or children of immigrants.

My work is inspired by U.S. immigration history. I study stereotypes and prejudice toward nationality groups, belonging in immigrants, and national identity.

More ways to check out my research:

Stereotypes and Prejudice

Broadly, my research highlights the heterogeneity of how people stereotype others on the basis of nationality and demonstrates the importance of disaggregating nationality from race/ethnicity when assessing stereotypes and attitudes.

Toprakkıran, S. & Lai. C. K (under review). The relationship between stereotypes about nationality and stereotypes about race/ethnicity.

How and when do stereotypes of U.S. nationality groups differ from stereotypes of associated racial/ethnic groups? We created a novel measure of "stereotype distance" to examine these patterns and conducted follow-up studies to establish its predictors.

Toprakkıran, S., & Lai, C. K. (2024, May 15). Stereotypes and Attitudes Toward Nationality Groups in the United States. PsyArXiv.

What are stereotypes of nationality groups in the U.S.? We examined 15 stereotypes toward 28 nationality groups and 6 racial/ethnic groups in 7,000+ participants.

Immigrants' Belonging

I aim to understand the effects of cultural stressors on immigrants' felt inclusion and belonging in the U.S. My work ranges from experimental studies, manipulating policy instability, to real-life app development.

Toprakkıran, S., Schachter, A., & Lai. C. K (under review). Does Perceiving Immigration Policy as Unstable Reduce Immigrants’ Felt Inclusion in the United States?

Immigration policies in the U.S. are unstable, with frequent changes to paperwork requirements, work authorization, and deportation enforcement. In two experiments, we manipulate perceived policy instability and punitiveness and examine their implications for immigrants' felt inclusion.

Toprakkıran, S., Arigbabu, R., & Schachter, A. (in prep). Toward an Accessible Storytelling Intervention to Improve U.S. Immigrants’ Belonging.

As part of Moving Stories - A Programmatic Grant, we are developing a public story-sharing app for improving immigrants' belonging to the U.S. and U.S.-born Americans' attitudes toward immigrants. We have conducted 5 mixed methods, experimental studies, and are currently running additional studies.

Other related works:

Hill, P., Toprakkıran, S., Strecher, V.J., Wolk, M.W. Purpose, life satisfaction, and self-rated health in immigrant and non-immigrant adults. Psychology, Health & Medicine.

Hill, P., Beatty, J.F., Toprakkıran, S., Wolk, M.W. Cultural stress and immigrant well-being: The role of sense of purpose. Cultural Diversity and Ethnic Minority Psychology.

National Identity

A common identity, such as national identity may bring people together and lead to positive intergroup attitudes. At the same time, it can increase polarization, especially when the boundaries of common identities differ across individuals. A restrictive national identity might invoke more negative attitudes toward others who are excluded from this identity.

My work aims to explore how national identities are conceptualized and defined, and how national identification is linked to stereotypes and prejudice toward others.

Toprakkıran, S., Gordils, J., Jamieson, J.P. Can Democrats and Republicans Like Each Other? Depends on How You Define "American". Frontiers in Social Psychology.

Erisen, C., Guidi, M., Martini, S., Toprakkıran, S., Isernia, P. & Littvay, L. Psychological correlates of populist attitudes. Political Psychology.

Toprakkıran, S., & Gordils, J. The onset of COVID-19, common identity, and intergroup prejudice. The Journal of Social Psychology.

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