The Limits of Sympathy: How Age and Family Status Affect Attitudes toward Refugee Children (With Kerim Can Kavakli).
Scholars have extensively examined the attitudes of host communities towards adult refugees and migrants, but little attention has been given to understanding how child refugees are perceived. Consequently, although children make up forty percent of global refugees, we have limited understanding of the factors that influence perceptions of this group and whether these factors differ from those affecting adult refugees. To address this gap, we conducted four survey experiments in Turkey and the United States. We find that host communities often respond more sympathetically to refugee children, viewing them as innocent and vulnerable. However, this effect is modest in size and primarily extends to orphans who are seen as particularly helpless. Furthermore, host communities evaluate refugee children similarly to adults, focusing on productivity and potential for integration. These results highlight constraints on humanitarian responses toward vulnerable children, and suggest several areas of future research on this understudied population.