ISR survey of Arab Americans is set to start in 2003 ANN ARBOR—A landmark study of Arab Americans in the Detroit area will be conducted by the University of Michigan Institute for Social Research (ISR), according to ISR research scientist Wayne Baker, the project’s team leader. "The aftermath of Sept. 11 has brought new urgency to issues of national identity, multiculturalism and social trust and has raised new questions about what ‘being an American’ means," said Baker, who is principal investigator of the study with U-M Dearborn Center for Arab American Studies researcher Ronald Stockton. "In defending themselves against the suspicion of terrorism, Arab Americans have been forced to confront their own national, religious and ethnic commitments, as well as their trust in U.S. institutions. This survey will also explore their relationships to each other, to non-Arab Americans and to their relatives, friends and other Arabs in the Middle East." Funding for the survey comes from a $755,000 grant from the Russell Sage Foundation, along with seed money provided by the U-M in both Ann Arbor and Dearborn. Currently estimated at 100,000 to 300,000 persons, the tri-county Detroit Arab American and Chaldean community is one of the largest, most concentrated and best known Arab expatriate populations in the world. According to Baker and Stockton, it is also one of the most diverse, in religion as well as national origin, with Lebanese, Palestinians, Yemenis and Iraqis living alongside Syrians, Jordanians, Egyptians, Moroccans and people from other Middle Eastern and North African countries. By sampling 1,000 Arab Americans in the Detroit area, plus another 500 non-Arabs, the researchers hope to document the similarities and differences in attitudes, behavior and opinions among various Arab American groups and between these groups and other Americans. Face-to-face interviews with randomly selected residents are scheduled to begin in the early spring of 2003 and will continue throughout the summer. The ISR survey research team will recruit Arabic-speaking interviewers from the community to conduct the survey, and is working with community groups in developing the survey questionnaire. Preliminary findings will be available in fall 2003. Co-principal investigators of the study include U-M researchers Sally Howell, Ann Chih Lin, Andrew Shryock and Mark Tessler and Columbia University researcher Amaney Jamal. Established in 1948, the Institute for Social Research (ISR) is among the world’s oldest survey research organizations and a world leader in the development and application of social science methodology. ISR conducts some of the most widely-cited studies in the nation, including the Survey of Consumer Attitudes, the National Election Studies, the Monitoring the Future Study, the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, the Health and Retirement Study, the Columbia County Longitudinal Study and the National Survey of Black Americans. ISR researchers also collaborate with social scientists in more than 60 nations on the World Values Surveys and other projects, and the Institute has established formal ties with universities in Poland, China, and South Africa. Visit the ISR Web site at www.isr.umich.edu for more information. ISR is also home to the Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR), the world’s largest computerized social science data archive.

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