Acculturation and Well-being among Migrant Populations: A Systematic Review

Despite globalisation effects, heightened displacement of populations, dynamic demographic changes and the need to understand how immigrants cope, integrate and deal with risks are of paramount practical importance. Cultural changes that migrants face after moving to a host country can lead to a wide number of both positive and negative outcomes for their health and impact their personal and professional trajectory. The ripple effect of these salient consequences extends to all aspects of the host country’s environment. The current literature, which focuses on the relationship between acculturation and well-being, is extremely vast and requires a meticulous summary of results from existing empirical quantitative studies. We used the PRISMA method to select, analyse and index empirical articles and identified the factors that moderate the relationship between the two variables, with implications for practitioners, policy-makers and academics. Our conclusions show that there are fluctuations in the use of various methodologies used to study well-being and acculturation and that the variables unfold differently across countries, depending on a varied array of mediating factors.