Ethnic Composition, School Ideology, and Boundaries Between Arab and Jewish Students

Research question/goal: 

This project examines how school factors such as ethnic composition and school ideology affect group boundaries between Arab and Jewish students in Israel, focusing on three dimensions of boundaries: social relationships and mutual attitudes, lifestyles, and collective identities. The project will collect longitudinal network data in Israel schools. Based on these data, we will address three research questions. First, how and why do group boundaries vary in schools with different ethnic composition and ideologies? Second, how do group boundaries change, captured by both age and duration in school? Finally, how do different dimensions of group boundaries such as identities, lifestyles, attitudes, and friendships affect one another?

Current stage: 

Since the aftermath of the Covid-19 pandemic continued to impede the data collection in schools, the project has shifted its attention from schools to universities and other higher education institutions. After successfully recruiting cohorts of first-year students in different fields of study, the project is currently in the stage of data collection. The collection of the first wave of data started at the end of the year 2022. The second wave will be surveyed in early summer 2023 and the third in the fall of 2023.

Fact sheet

Funding: 
DFG
Duration: 
2020 to 2024
Status: 
continued elsewhere
Data Sources: 
primary data collection
Geographic Space: 
Israel

Publications