Course talk:POLI380JAN2011Owen/Survey/Immigration--Issue of Admission

Could someone summarize the 5 questions on Course page? If this is made in a day or so, that contribution will still be counted. By TA, GoMurakami 15:10, 9 February 2011 (PST)

Alright guys. It's two days before the due date and it's time to tighten up. From my understanding, here are the five most pertinent questions we have come up with, in their current, tentative format:

1)Do you think that the Canadian Government should give priority mostly to immigrants who are able to invest financially into the country? Answers: 1. Yes 2. No

2)Do you believe immigration is a positive contirbutor to the Canadian economy? Answers: 1.strongly agree 2.agree 3.somewhat agree 4. disagree 5.strongly disagree

3)Do you believe that the policy of multiculturalism in response to immigration is a positive contributor to Canadian society? Answers: 1.strongly agree 2.agree 3.somewhat agree 4. disagree 5.strongly disagree

4)Which of the following types of immigrants should be given priority to immigrate to Canada? Answers: 1.Family Class 2.Economic Class 3.Refugees/Asylum Seekers 4.Prefer not to answer

5)Currently, Canada accepts 240,000-265,000 immigrants each year. Is this number: Answers: 1.Too high 2.Too low 3.About right

• Note that inclusion of the "Upon arrival" question seems to be up in the air right now.

If everyone is in agreement that these are the five questions we have most focused on and want to continue doing so (please correct me if I'm wrong), let's keep working on them in their respective threads. I just thought that I'd "step back" for a moment to make sure we're on track with the assignment for the due date :). Also, it may be worth noting that (1) and (4) are kind of similar. If we decide to keep both, we should consider the order in which we ask them since (1) will likely have the respondent considering ideas that will affect their answer for (4), ideas that otherwise would not have been elicited.

Pawel,

Crunch time... Are we expected to have our five questions finalized and in order by tomorrow?

In the interest of keeping things simple I'd like to withdraw my "Upon Arrival" line of questioning.

Also, I would propose that we order the above questions in the following order: 2), 3), 1), 4), and 5).

Thoughts? Votes?

Jaime

Great suggestion Jaime. But I would make a small change and suggest the order of 2,3,5,4,1.

My reasoning for this is that 2 and 3 coming prior to 5 will make the respondent consider the two most politically salient issues of immigration (regarding costs and benefits) on the population in general before answering our most general question regarding the respondent's opinion on immigration. 1 may result in people considering the positive effects of immigration so it should come last since the succession of questions 2 and 3, in my mind, influence a possibly neutral vantage point from which we want our respondents to answer subsequent questions. Finally, 4 should come before 1 because it may cause the respondent to consider all that we want him to consider for related question 1, whereas vice versa may not be true.

If this is satisfactory, in order to finalize our questions, what does everyone think of changing the possible answers of 4 to what I suggested in my last post in the "Who should be given priority?" thread?

Jaime and Robb:

I concur with Pawel's order of 2,3,5,4,1. Also, regarding changing the answers to #4, Pawel: I say let's do it because then we can come to know what choices our respondents choose in order of preference.

Thoughts everyone?

Hi All,

I agree with Pawel's order of 2,3,5,4,1. However, I feel #1 is a bit redundant since it's a follow up question to #4. We may as well be asking if the refugees should be given priority or those who seek for family reunification should be given priority.

There was another question asking if Canada's immigration policies should be reformed to be more generous or more strict. I believe that would be a good question to be included since it does speak about the issue of admission, which is our topic area.

So instead of #1, can we replace it with the question from "possible survey question" thread? Except perhaps rephrase the question so it is more suitable for our survey?

Or sorry, is that already #5 on our survey?

hi everybody,

i think so far we have 5 pretty good survey questions. I like Pawel's ordering of 2,3,5,4,1. The questions follow up smoothly, making it easier to answer, without any confusion. Even though number 4 and number 1 are questions similar in nature, please note that number one specifically refers to entrepreneurs and investors (please see the statistics for this question under "foreign investment" section). Thus, I believe they may be similar but have different outcomes. the foreign investment section solely concentrates on investments of min. 800,000 Canadian dollars, that would be invested into a Canadian business, creating more working spaces and also driving the Canadian economy up. It has a separate section in the Canadian Immigration Policy, solely created for investors/entrepreneurs, not necessarily a skilled worker. All in all i really like the outcome and i think so far we accomplished a lot. Great Job! :)

I have a quick suggestion to question#5, can we provide the percentage that number is to Canadian population? It just struck me that when we are doing the surveys, the respondents are randomly selected and they may or may not know how that number is relatively to our national population but rather to their own scale of number. By providing the national population next to the number of immigrants admitted each year, the respondents can provide a somehow more educated estimate of how they feel about the number. Does this make sense?

I agree with Yang, and really like that idea for question number 5. we could provide the national population which is around 35 million and say that: Currently, Canada accepts 240,000-265,000 immigrants each year, which corresponds to 0.69%-0.76% of the Canadian population. Is this number: Answers: 1.Too high 2.Too low 3.About right I think due to this comparison, people could give a more accurate answer. What do you guys think?

I agree with Yang. We should give respondents an idea of how relative 240,000-265,000 immigrants is, rather than just an absolute value. Unless we only ask other poli sci students (which wouldn't be a random sample and a pretty bad idea), we shouldn't make any assumptions on how familiar respondents are with Canada's population and immigration process. I think if we give them the percentage of the Cdn population, then it will lower the chances their answers are completely arbitrary. According to the Stats Canada website, as of October 2010, Canada's estimated population was: 34,238,035. So what does everyone think about rephrasing question to:

Currently, Canada accepts 240,000-265,000 immigrants each year, which is approximately 0.70-0.77% of the Canadian population. Is this number: Answers: 1.Too high 2.Too low 3.About right

I realize its late in the game but I would be interested in finding out whether the respondent lives in an area (neighbourhood) where he/she feels there is a high number of immigrants (already living there). For example:

Where I live there are high levels of immigrants:

1)Strongly Agree 2) Agree 3) Disagree 4) Strongly Disagree 5) Not Sure

I just think that people who live in Richmond and Surrey might generate a different response than people who live in Kistilano. I believe this would influence all answers but I am fully aware we can only ask 5 questions. Like Pawel said I think questions 1 and 4 are really similar.

It seems like lot's of folks are in support of changing (5), and Dana's suggestion seems to encompass the concerns over (5) voiced in this thread. So, I vote for Leyla and Dana's modification. Also, since no one's voiced anything against my proposal to change the possible answers of (4) to rank ordering, I'm going to input that as well as the aforementioned new (5) in this now-updated 5-question proposal:

1)Do you think that the Canadian Government should give priority mostly to immigrants who are able to invest financially into the country? Answers: 1. Yes 2. No

2)Do you believe immigration is a positive contirbutor to the Canadian economy? Answers: 1.strongly agree 2.agree 3.somewhat agree 4. disagree 5.strongly disagree

3)Do you believe that the policy of multiculturalism in response to immigration is a positive contributor to Canadian society? Answers: 1.strongly agree 2.agree 3.somewhat agree 4. disagree 5.strongly disagree

4)Currently, Canada accepts 240,000-265,000 immigrants each year, which corresponds to 0.69%-0.76% of the Canadian population. Is this number: Answers: 1.Too high 2.Too low 3.About right

• 5)Regarding the following three classes of immigrants admitted into Canada, family reunification (FR), economic migrants (EM), and refugee or asylum seekers (RAS), how would you rank the importance of these three classes of immigrants being admitted to Canada?

1.FR<EM<RAS 2.FR<RAS<EM 3.RAS<EM<FR 4.RAS<FR<EM 5.EM<RAS<FR 6.EM<FR<RAS 7.Prefer not to answer

• (5) looks a bit messy to me. Any suggestions on how to clean it up?

Lastly: I was writing this while Leo was also writing. What do people think of Leo's suggestion? I think it's good to vary up questions, but asking people about whether they think a lot of immigrants live in their neighborhood doesn't seem like it would lead to a very revealing answer. Maybe something about how they *felt* about immigrants living in their neighbourhoods? Also, if we change a question then we have to reconsider the ordering again...

Hey all, firstly, sorry I'm so late arriving to the game; secondly, I agree with Leo's premise that it would be cool to find out if the respondent lives in a high-density neighborhood of immigrants, but also agree with Pawel's response that it may not lead to as revealing or significant an answer that we'll need given our limited 5-question capacity. I also agree that questions 1 and 4 are similar enough that it might warrant some revisiting; by framing the first question in terms of immigration and finances we may be vectoring the respondent towards a certain set of responses; they might answer question four with question one already in the back of their mind, giving not a biased answer but one they might give in order to be congruous with their answer to the first question.

In response to 5 looking a bit unwieldy, perhaps we could look more at the respondent choosing which class of immigrant they think possesses the best eligibility for admission and ranking that in a '5. Strongly agree, 4. Agree...' kinda format. It doesn't give as complete information but it does narrow down the information we'd be receiving to be more manageable/malleable.

Pawel I agree its a better option to write how people "felt." I do think we need to change question 1... I am having a hard time coming up with anything other than geographic distribution of immigrants. If anyone has any other ideas please share.

In developing countries, including Canada, we are seeing increasing limitations put on immigration policies, especially toward refugees. Do you feel that current immigration policies should be reformed to be more lenient for immigration admission policies?

1. Strongly Agree 2. Agree 3. Disagree 4. Strongly Disagree

OR

1. Yes 2. No

Hi Wendy, perhaps we can modify the sentence so that it is a bit more specific. Are you suggesting that Canada, a developed country, should reform its immigration policy to be more generous for ALL potential immigrants (asylum seekers, refugees, skilled workers, family reunification, provincial nominees, etc) or ONLY more generous to refugees?

And I think

1. Strongly Agree 2. Agree 3. Neutral 4. Disagree 5. Strongly Disagree 6. I don't know

would be suitable in this case.

AnitaYu 23:11, 29 January 2011 (PST)

Hello everyone,

I think the question

"should Canada reform its immigration policy to limit immigrants in "--------" category"

would provide the best insight if asked as three seperate question. The three main categories being: skilled worker, family reunification and refugee.

What you guys think?

Hi Amrit, your idea is great, but please keep in mind that our group can only come up with a total of 5 questions.

Should Canada reform its current immigration policies to become more restrictive or more generous towards future immigrants?

1. Very Restrictive 2. Restrictive 3. Status Quo 4. Generous 5. Very Generous 6. I don't know

Would this question incorporate all our ideas into one? Thoughts please, thanks!

Hi Anita, You bring up a good point about there only being 5 questions--something I think all of us need to keep in mind. Also, I really like the question you pose, but just to be clear do you think that our respondents will understand the fundamental difference between "immigrant" and refugee/asylum-seeker. For instance, a respondent may just pool all categories into one under the "immigrant" umbrella. You know what I mean? -Aman

Hi everyone,

I think it's important to start by giving the respondent a general idea of how many immigrants actually come to Canada in one given year. And then from there we can move on to asking more specific questions (i.e. impact on economy, integration, etc.) What about a simple and straight-forward question like the following:

"Currently, Canada accepts 240,000-265,000 immigrants each year, is the # Too high/Too low/About right?" This way the respondent isn't bombarded with a loaded question to begin with, and is given an idea of how many immigrants are actually admitted.

Let me know your thoughts:)

I agree with Aman, I think it would be a good idea to include definitions in our survey, so all the respondents are on the same page. (In fact, at first I was a little concerned about putting refugee and asylum seekers in one category, because they don't necessary mean the same thing...)

Anyway, here's a few definitions we can note in our survey For example: Immigrants- a person who migrates to another country, usually for permanent residence Refugee- One who flees in search of refuge, as in times of war, political oppression, or religious persecution Asylum seeker- a person who, from fear of persecution for reasons of race, religion, social group, or political opinion, has crossed an international frontier into a country in which he or she hopes to be granted refugee status

Great idea, Aman.

What do you think about about including a statistic like that for say, the US, UK or Australia, etc? That way respondents will be able to see if 240,000-265,000 is relative. Thoughts?

I like the idea of adding stats from different countries as a basis of comparison. For the same reason I think we should use immigrants as a percentage of population as opposed to the absolute number.

Hey guys,

I know we've come up with most of our survey questions, but I came across this article in Macleans that relates to our topic quite nicely. It's basically about how the Canadian government's been giving preferential treatment to immigrant applicants from South Asia and China over Latin America and the Caribbean because second-generation youth from China and South Asia are better educated. Anyways the article ends with a pretty provocative question: Do some countries offer better immigrants than others?

I think the question is really interesting. What you guys think?

Here's a link to the article if anyone wants to take a gander: http://www2.macleans.ca/2010/06/17/who-doesnt-get-into-canada/

Hi Amrit,

   It's a very interesting topic that you have brought up. I think the country profiling that some people accused the government of is rather vague. It might simply be that more qualified applicants are from Asian countries simply because there are so many of them in terms of number and so much of these people are either well educated or highly experienced in businesses. This could be merely a ratio problem instead of the admission officials being secretly doing country profiling. The Jessica Thomas case is very unfortunate, but it might be affected by having so many cases of sham marriages among new immigrants rather than being discriminated by her and her husband's ethnicity. Any alternative views?

Hey guys and gals, this possible question might seem a tad too blunt or general, but what do you all think about this question regarding immigration:

"Do you agree that Immigration is a positive contributor to Canadian society and the economy as a whole?"

The answers would be "Agree" and "Disagree".

This question would tell us the prevailing notion of the public regarding the issue of immigration. Specifically, it gives us a general idea of the percentage of the people who think that immigration is a good thing for the economy and the country.

Hello everyone,

Jerome-Maybe dividing the question to form two would be better. The question of the contribution to society and to the economy may not go hand in hand for people since this is an ongoing debate maybe it would be better to divide them. We would have to better define society as a whole I think maybe figuring out some components outside of the economy e.g.The Arts or intercultural understanding that immigrants could contribute to so that we could determine overall whether immigration is positive.

Do you believe immigration is a positive contirbutor to the Canadian economy? 1.strongly agree 2.agree 3.somewhat agree 4. disagree 5.strongly disagree

Some other suggested questions that could help paint a paint a picture o Do you believe immigration has improved intercultural understanding within Canadian society? Do you believe the Canadian Immigration policy is "open" (non-discriminatory) Do you feel that Canadian immigration is too lenient/strict

Hey guys. To continue with Rudo's attempt at dividing up Jerome's double barreled question, I like Rudo's question on the economy ("Do you believe immigration is a positive contirbutor to the Canadian economy? ..."), and I think that the concept of "multiculturalism" touches a lot of "components outside of the economy". Thus, maybe we should ask a second question of:

Do you believe that the policy of multiculturalism is a positive contributor to Canadian society? 1.strongly agree 2.agree 3.somewhat agree 4. disagree 5.strongly disagree

Lastly, if we ask a question like "Do you feel that Canadian immigration is too lenient/strict?" then, similarly to what I said about Leyla's proposal in the thread title "Foreign Investment", we need to be aware of when and where this question is placed because of how we may "turn on" or make pertinent certain beliefs of our interviewees that we don't necessarily want to since this may affect later questions that we would prefer the interviewee to consider with a more neutral mindset.

Hey all,

Just wanted to know your thoughts on the placement of questions...Which topic/question do you suggest we start with? I ask this because depending on how we start the survey, it may end up influencing/directing the respondent's answers in a particular direction. For instance, if we start of with "Immigration as a positive contributor survey question", the respondent may automatically adopt the idea that immigration is positive and so answer accordingly.

Let me know what you think:)

Hey everyone,

First of all, thanks to Rudo and Pawel for suggesting that we split up my initial question into two or more. I think that's a much better way of approaching the issue and allows us to see what kind of reasoning a respondent may have regarding his/her views on immigration.

Pawel and Aman make excellent points regarding the placement and timing of questions. Poor timing and placement could make a respondent too predisposed towards a certain viewpoint.

I agree that we probably shouldn't start with a question like "Are you in favour of greater/lesser immigration..." etc...

Hey guys,

Why don't we ask about citizens' personal view about immigration? Whether or not they think it is a good think for society...because we know that extensive immigration can cause social issues such as segregation, gang violence, or lack of national unity. On the other hand, it can be seen as a good thing because it can bring economic recovery to the country.

“Canada plans to welcome between 240,000 and 265,000 new permanent residents in 2010, the same number of immigrants as in recent years. In 2010, Canada will again welcome more new permanent residents than the average annual intake during the 1990s,” said Minister Kenney. “The focus of the 2010 plan is on economic immigration to support Canada’s economy during and beyond the current economic recovery.”

Source: http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/department/media/releases/2009/2009-10-30.asp

1.) Do you think allowing as many as 265,000 new permanent residents into Canada will have a positive or negative effect on the social fabric of Canada?

___positive ___ negative

2.) Do you agree that immigration of workers is an effective means for economic recovery?

-strongly agree - agree - somewhat agree - disagree -strongly disagree

Hi Emily. I especially like your second question since it may cause the interviewee to realize a "real world, positive contribution" of immigrants, as opposed to how most general questions about immigration (eg. "Do you support higher or lower amounts of immigration?") that allow a larger amount of imagining. What I mean by the latter is that we can avoid "social desirability" influencing responses, in either a pro- or anti-immigration sense, since your question #2 is applied and asks for more objective thinking than the example question I just mentioned. Regarding your first question, "social fabric" is a pretty vague term, in my humble opinion. Also, in the "Immigration as a positive contributor survey question" thread I proposed that we have a question like this but involving multiculturalism. I know that multiculturalism is a more narrow question than what you're asking regarding social fabric, but maybe a narrower point of focus would allow us to measure answers better? What do you think?

Hi Pawel,

Yes, I saw your comment about multiculturalism as a positive contributor. I think that narrowing it down into that aspect is better than a broad term. I guess what I am trying to say is whether the effect of immigration is good for the society as a whole, because even multiculturalism can have negative effects to the social unity. I think I want to know whether citizens are in favour of this correlation of multiculturalism and high level of immigration.

This question may be touching on a more sensitive issue.

Which of the following types of immigrants should be given priority to immigrate to Canada?

1. Family Class 2. Economic Class 3. Refugees/Asylum Seekers 4. Prefer not to answer 5. I don't know

What do you guys think?

Anita,

I thınk touchıng on sensıtıve ıssues could make thıs project quıte ınterestıng!

For starters, we should probably famılıarıze ourselves wıth Canada,s ımmıgratıon polıcıes before fınalızıng our questıons. The followıng websıte has a basıc breakdown of the categorıes people can apply to when ımmıgratıng to Canada:

http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/immigrate/index.asp

Jaıme

Just wondering, since we are trying to find out answers that we can later apply to the rest of the world (not just canada) Should we change the unit of analysis to a few more developed countries, or are we sticking to Canada for every question?

I agree with Anita that sensitive issues make this kind of school work quite interesting. Also, Wendy, I think we ought to stick to Canada for every question for two reasons: 1) Because we can always later examine whether or not we can extrapolate our findings to other countries, and 2) Because different developed countries have (and have had) immigration policies different from ours, and created for different purposes. Hence, I think that most of our respondents will only be familiar with the Canadian context. ...Also, it seems that we've already begun deliberating only on Canadian questions anyway.

Ok sounds good.

I want to propose an alternation of the question started by Anita.

"Which of the following types of immigrants should be given priority to immigrate to Canada?

1. Family Class 2. Economic Class 3. Refugees/Asylum Seekers 4. Prefer not to answer 5. I don't know "

It sounds like we are given more than one choice, so we can change it to...

"Which reason do you think is the most important for immigrants to be admitted to Canada?

Or we can ask people to rate most important to least important

1. Family reunification 2. Employment opportunities 3. Refugee or Asylum Seeker 4. Other reasons

  __(Please state here)______                    "

Personally I think the first one is better.

Also, I don't think we should give people the choice to not answer, just to make analysis of our data easier and more accurate.

Hi All,

Yes, I agree with Pawel. We should limit this survey question to solely Canada due to the variation of immigration policies for every country. Besides, this is a survey conducted for BC Residents.

Perhaps I was not too clear with my question, I will try to make it more clear this time. Wendy, by asking respondents to rank the level of importance of immigrants is somewhat like my initial question. I think we should ask Canadians to choose which class of immigrants should be given priority since this is an highly debated area in immigration policy. We are interested in finding out which class of immigrants Canadians would agree to seeing more of. This means asking respondents to decide who to favor over the others. For instance, picking Class X over Class Y due to their personal reason Z. I would not include the opportunity for them to state the "other reasons" only because it is hard for us to take account of this variable (at least in this survey) since it varies across respondents. Hence, the "I don't know" or "prefer not to answer" options would probably be more suitable, though I am aware these responses cannot completely act as an alternative to the "other reasons" response, which would definitely be a great option to include for other surveys.

In addition, we should include the "I don't know" and "prefer not to answer" responses because we need to give Canadians the option to choose to not answer since it would be undemocratic and immoral to force citizens to select an answer unwillingly, let alone the potential inaccuracy that could cause! The respondents may have unforeseen reasons that we didn't take into account in the survey or they may not know enough information to answer this question, so it could make them feel uncomfortable by forcing them to answer. The survey will still be accurate despite the presence of the 2 options of not selecting a specific class. *Remember we can program this on SPSS!

Jaime, yes, for sure it's a good idea to take a look at the site you have provided. But many of the categories of potential immigrants fall under the economic class. So I thought instead of listing every category there is, it is more efficient to simply name the broad and more general class there are instead. Please include another class of immigrants to the response if it has not been included, thanks!

(Sorry about this lengthy response by the way!)

Hey,

I'm standing by having the option of "other reasons" as one of the choices for this research question and I don't mind adding in "Prefer not to say" or/ and "I don't know". "Other reasons" don't have to be followed by respondents stating what their reasons are if you feel it's going to be hard to organize, but if they do have other reasons that would be where they would check off. Without this option, as the initial question didn't have, people who immigrate for reasons such as education or love of country's culture.etc(perhaps not our focal study point)are not listed as an option for people to choose. This would result in inaccurate data collection.

Hello all,

I have to agree with the above two posts and say we SHOULD include the option of "other reasons/ prefer not to say" in the survey question. As stated by Wendy, it's crucial that we account for other (z) variables and refrain from assuming that the reasons we list are the only reasons out there.

-Aman

I would agree that we should include a "Prefer not to say" option, but I'm not convinced on the "I don't know" option. Should we really have 2 null options for this question? What do you think of changing "I don't know" to "No group should be given priority" as a different option?

If we go with the question posed by Wendy, and people choose the "Other reasons" option, will there be a follow up question? I believe Prof. Owen said a follow up question will count as one of our 5 questions. I think a follow up be might a waste when there are so many other great questions we could ask.

Sounds like most folks are supportive of a "Prefer not to say" option. With this in mind, and after considering how we can use a preference ordering method (p37 of textbook) in questioning our respondents' preferences, here is my proposition:

Regarding the following three classes of immigrants into Canada, family reunification (FR), economic migrants (EM), and refugee or asylum seekers (RAS), how would you rank the importance of these three classes of immigrants being admitted to Canada?

1.FR<EM<RAS 2.FR<RAS<EM 3.RAS<EM<FR 4.RAS<FR<EM 5.EM<RAS<FR 6.EM<FR<RAS 7.Prefer not to answer

Hi everyone,

Not long time ago, I have read couple articles about different programs that the Canadian Government offers to foreign investors. Basically saying, that "if somebody invests into the country in a sum of for example "500,000 $", will be guaranteed to become a Canadian Permanent Resident and will be allowed to run his/her own business here in Canada. Certainly this way the Government tries to bring more foreign investors into Canada, in order to improve the economy. These kind of programs are not new, but they are always modified, creating new incentives for investors to come into the country. So now just a simple question that I had in my mind.

Do you think that the Canadian Government should limit its choices of Immigrants it admits (or lets say give priority) mostly to those who are able to invest into the country?

Answers: 1. Yes 2. No

or

Answers (% of investors from total amount of immigrants that are admitted): 1. 0-20% 2. 20-50% 3. 50-70% 4. 70-100%

What do you guys think?

Leyla, this is certainly an interesting question. However, I think that we have to be careful about when and where we place it in our series questions. For example, if we mention that financially-investing-immigrants come to Canada, then that may put immigrants in a non-neutral light (ie. a positive one, since 'investors are good') if they were to then be asked a question like the one in the next thread title, ie. "Do you agree that Immigration is a positive contributor to Canadian society and the economy as a whole?" Also, and this is something to think about regarding all of our questions, I'm not sure if we ought to ask questions about increasing or decreasing percentages for specific types of immigrants without giving information about the actual percentages that specific kinds of immigrants/refugees compose Canada's inflow, since, as I learned in my Poli 328A, the public knows very little about immigration issues and thus they wouldn't be giving an 'educated opinion'. Unless, of course, we want to measure only public opinion on such a matter...

Pawel:

You bring up a few really good/significant points. I'm also in Poli 328a, and those are things we must keep in mind.. But I definitely like the issue/question posed by Leyla! What about just keeping it simple (without percentages), as Leyla originally stated? That way we can get an idea of whether Canadians think of foreign investment as a contributing factor (or not) to Canadian society/economy..which seems to be the general scope of research question.

Thoughts?

Thanks Pawel and Aman for your contributions. You guys have a point, and I agree that asking specifically for percentages is not fully correct. Also one should be careful about the way the question is constructed. Since people may refuse to answer a question that might intimidate them. I believe just answering "yes or no" would be sufficient. The Question should be as you guys mentioned: Do you think that foreign investment (foreign investors immigrating to Canada) is a positive contributor to the Canadian society/economy? However tell the truth, I believe we can develop the question further, make it more detailed. any thoughts?

I think it would be nice to add some statistics. This is what I have found on the cic website:

Investors

The Immigrant Investor Program seeks experienced business people to invest C$800,000 into Canada’s economy and become permanent residents. Investors must:

show that they have business experience have a minimum net worth of C$1,600,000 that was obtained legally and make a C$800,000 investment. Your investment is managed by Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC) and is guaranteed by the Canadian provinces that use it to create jobs and help their economies grow.

CIC will return your C$800,000 investment, without interest, about five years and two months after payment.

So mainly the idea of attracting investors, is to create spaces for work and develop the Canadian economy.

http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/pdf/research-stats/facts2009.pdf According to the statistics of 2009, 2,872 (principal applicants) and 7,435 (spouses and dependants) were admitted to Canada. Keeping in mind that each of them would have invested min. C$800,000, this would be definitely a positive contributor to the Canadian economy and to the society, decreasing the unemployment in Canada. If we give a brief intro before asking the survey question, this would help the individuals to reply more accurately. However again the question should be formulated in more detail.

Hi guys

It appears as though we all have survey questions but we have not yet formulated a research question that we believe would bring together some of the survey questions presented.

Having read through the suggested questioning it appears as though we are looking to more generally determine whether Immigration is contributive to society in Canada.(if not that is ok we can come up with another overall research question)

Since we are expected to produce 5 survey questions in the end maybe we can pick from the suggested survey questions which ones would help us capture the necessary aspects we would need to consider "contributive." Also the ordering of the questions would help because based on some of the responses we would be able to see whether people believe there has been e.g. greater economic contribution and therefore they may respond that the priority should be on immigrant workers. Below I just sketched out a way we could try using some of the questions we have

Economically-->e.g. do recent ımmıgrants to Canada have access to the tools and/or programs necessary for them to begın contrıbutıng to both the Canadıan economy and socıety ın general? 1. Strongly Agree 2. Agree 3. Neutral 4. Dısagree 5. Stongly Dısagree Do you believe immigration is a positive contirbutor to the Canadian economy? 1.strongly agree 2.agree 3.somewhat agree 4. disagree 5.strongly disagree

Socially-->E.g.Do you believe immigration has improved intercultural understanding within Canadian society?

Concluding-->"Which of the following types of immigrants should be given priority to immigrate to Canada? 1. Family Class 2. Economic Class 3. Refugees/Asylum Seekers 4. Prefer not to answer 5. I don't know "

(Apologies for the length of this)

I think that the conversation you've started here is great, Rudo, and that maybe it can merge with and be continued with under the thread title below of "Immigration as a positive contributor survey question."

Hello everyone,

Yes, I agree that we should formulate these questions with an overarching research question...and then base our survey questions/ hypothesis from there. If we all agree upon one overarching theme of "is immigration a (positive) contributor to Canadian society?" then this would make all our questions much easier.

Hı,

When you read about ımmıgratıon ıssues ın Germany, France or the Netherlands for example, the dıscussıon often revolves around ıntegratıon. In Canada, perhaps owıng to our more loosely defıned sense of ıdentıty, the offıcıal lıne ıs one of multıculturalısm and the acceptance of all cultures alongsıde one and other.

I would be ınterested ın explorıng the extent to whıch dıfferent ımmıgrant groups ın Canada ıntegrate ınto "Canadıan" socıety. The lıne of questıonıng could start off wıth: In your opınıon, do recent ımmıgrants to Canada have access to the tools and/or programs necessary for them to begın contrıbutıng to both the Canadıan economy and socıety ın general? 1. Strongly Agree 2. Agree 3. Neutral 4. Dısagree 5. Stongly Dısagree

Thoughts?

HI Jaime,

I completely agree with you about the importance of incorporating the concept of integration and immigration in our survey; however, I think the question you suggest may be just a bit overloaded...How about just asking whether 'recent immigrants to Canada have access tools/programs' necessary for them to adequately integrate into Canada?" The only part I'm concerned with is the aspect of newcomers contributing to both Canadian economy and society in general--this part seems too broad. What do you think?

Hey guys,

I was just wondering if the questions you guys are asking line up with Jaimie's objective which is to find out the extent to which different different immigrant groups in Canada integrate into Canadian society. Presumably all immigrant groups will have equal access to the tools/programs that allow them to integrate. And just to clarify by tools/ programs are we're referring to stuff like English classes, education on Canadian values, settlement programs right?

Aman, I think your question is important because it measures the adequacy of existing programs, but I think if we're going to understand Jaimie's objective, we need an additional question that measures the extent to which different immigrant groups feel integrated into Canadian society. I'm thinking the only way we can do this is by having two questions:

1) If you were born outside of Canada, what is your country/continent/area of origin? 2)Do you feel that you belong in Canadian society?

The second question is a bit tricky. I'm not really sure what the best wording would be for that question.

Anyways, I hope that makes sense. Let me know what you think.

Aman,

I like your rephrasing. Good call on being more direct by using the word integrate.

I think that in general, our survey might be more interesting if we pursue a line of questioning that asks about something the respondents already know. By that I mean I don't think we should have to preface our questions with stats that might sway their responses. For example, if we decide to tell respondents that there are x number of immigrants every year, they might think it a huge number when in reality it could be low relative to other years/other countries etc. Our own biases tend to come through the more context we try to provide as a preface.

Thoughts?

Jaime

Hey guys,

Although I think integration is a crucial aspect of immigration, I'm worried we're getting away from our topic: the Issue of Admission. I think any questions on integration would be best left to the "Issue of Settlement" group. Thoughts?

Jaime: Agreed. Let's refrain from using specific numbers for the reasons you mentioned.

Dana: You raise a good point. Hmm.. but on the other hand, immigrants (upon arrival) can also feel extremely overwhelmed and may require specific assistance right away (i.e. esl programs for example), in order to help them with the transition into settlement...I suppose we can ask if the respondent thinks the programs we have in place are adequate for when the immigrants first arrive...so they are then prepared for settlement? Or something along those lines..? Let me know what you all think!:)

I'm still not convinced about the "Upon Arrival" topic. Once immigrants (who have gone through the immigration application process, which presumably is what we're discussing) arrive onto Canadian soil, they have already been admitted. The only exception to this is asylum seekers, whose application to stay in Canada can be either accepted or rejected. Their "issue of admission" is still up for debate, but not for immigrants who have already been admitted by the Citizenship & Immigration Canada and are now physically in Canada. I really believe that our topic of admission ends once immigrants have arrived in Canada. Any questions regarding welcome programs, assistance, integration into society belong under settlement.

Just had a thought about your point, Aman. How about including a question related to integration/treatment of asylum seekers. The MV Sun Sea from Sri Lanka garnered a lot of press and attention last August so it's likely that respondents will have an opinion or at least have the incident relatively fresh in their minds. Maybe we could ask a question about the Sun Sea in particular, or asylum seekers that arrive in a similar manner.

I just wanted to say that I really like how succinct and to-the-point everyone is in our group. This means that, unlike the other immigration group, all of us don't have to sort through heaps of paragraphs to find out what is the relevant point that another group member is trying to contribute. I just thought that I'd explicitly propose that we keep on working like this.