The aim of the study is to compare health outcomes of migrants and the native German population, testing for the existence of a Healthy Immigrant Effect (HIE). The study contributes a broad theoretical analysis of the HIE and makes use of a wide spectrum of variables to model health (using the SF-12). The HIE is marked by an observed health advantage for migrants, when compared to the host population, which declines with the years since migration. Assessing different types of selection processes, it is assumed that mass migration to post-industrial countries is characterized by favouring the inflow of healthy individuals from weaker economies working in the low-wage sector due to the cost aspect of migration and differences in wages for adequate work. Socioeconomic and -structural differences of migrant and host population as well as psychosocial stressors like acculturation cause the deteroriation of the health adavantage with increasing years since migration. Using cross-sectional data from the 2016 wave of the Socio-Economic Panel this study compares health outcomes (generated from the SF-12) between recent migrants (≤ 10 years since migration), non-recent migrants (> 10 years since migration) and the German native population. Propensity score matching analyses reveal a health advantage for recent migrants compared to non-recent migrants as well as to the German native population, while non-recent migrants remain statistically indistinguishable from the native German population, implying a health assimilation effect.

Measurement problems in terms of different understanding of the meaning, concepts and implications of survey questions as well as tendencies to different response-sets (e.g. acquiescence or social desirability) are reoccurring problems in comparative migration research. Cultural factors, time-varying effects and survey design lead to response biases. It could be shown that depending on the region of origin, migrants tend to extreme or centred responding behaviour. Macroscale changes in attitudes towards disclosure of personal information influence acquiescent biases. Therefore, the question arises whether the presence of measurement equivalence can be assumed, especially within instruments regarding subjective feelings, when comparing migrant and native populations. The aim of the study is to test for intercultural and longitudinal equivalence of the Health Short Form 12 - items scale (SF -12), trying to answer the question whether this instrument is useful to compare health of migrants and native Germans over time. The study contributes to the ongoing discussion on measurement equivalence of the SF -12 by including variables concerning integration and assimilation, employment, family status and varying types of migration and years since migration to the analysis. Using a Multiple Group Structural Equation Modelling approach analyzing longitudinal data of the German Socioeconomic Panel (SOEP), we test the validity and measurement equivalence (configural, metric and scalar invariance) of the latent construct ‘health’ over time and between (non-)migration groups. In addition, different item functioning can be detected for a series of covariates. The study concludes in recommending a reduced version of the SF-12 to improve the avoidance of measurement artefacts when comparing the health of migrants and native Germans.

Response-sets belong to reoccurring problems in migration research. Cultural factors, time-varying effects and survey design lead to response biases. It could be shown that depending on the region of origin, migrants tend to extreme or centred responding behaviour. Macroscale changes in attitudes towards disclosure of personal information influence acquiescent biases. Therefore, the question arises whether the presence of measurement equivalence can be assumed, especially within instruments regarding subjective feelings, when differences between migrant and native populations are the variable of interest. The aim of the study is to test for intercultural and longitudinal equivalence of the Short Form 12 - items scale (SF -12), trying to answer the question whether this instrument is useful to compare health of migrants and native Germans over time. The study contributes to the ongoing discussion on measurement equivalence of the SF -12 by including variables concerning integration and assimilation, employment, family status and varying types of migration and years since migration to the analysis. Using longitudinal data from the German Socioeconomic Panel (SOEP) and a Structural Equation Modelling approach, Different Item Functioning can be detected for a series of covariates. The study concludes in recommending a reduced version of the SF-12 to improve the avoidance of measurement artefacts when comparing the health of migrants and native Germans.