Immigrant status

“Immigrants” in this study were considered all individuals not born in Sweden. Immigrant status was based on the individual’s reason for immigration to Sweden. Two groups were formulated based on the participant’s country of birth and immigration year given by Statistics Sweden’s Total Population Register. Participants were designated as “refugees” whose country of birth and year of immigration match that of asylum-seekers to Sweden. “Non-refugees” were defined as those not from asylum-seeking countries. This proxy was used because the register information regarding a person’s reason for immigration is not reliable before 1998. Accordingly, all immigrants were categorised into these two groups, including individuals who came to Sweden for study or for family reunification. Throughout the rest of the paper, the term “immigrants” is used in reference to results that apply to all immigrants in the study (ie. to both refugees and non-refugees). The non-refugee and refugee groups were further stratified based on their duration of residence in Sweden, (3-9 years; 10-19 years; 20+ years). Individuals born in Sweden was the reference category and labelled “Swedish-born”. The register information for duration of residence in Sweden is based on the date that an individual’s residence permit is approved by the Migration Board and not from the immigrant’s date of entry into the country. Therefore some immigrants, particularly refugees, have been in Sweden longer than is noted in our dataset.