Examining Online Xenophobia, in-Person Discrimination, and Mental Health Among Venezuelan Migrant Youth in Colombia

Background and Purpose: Colombia, a country that shares a 2200-kilometer border with Venezuela and is the primary destination for Venezuelan migrants, will soon have more than 3 million Venezuelan crisis migrants residing within its borders, constituting an extraordinary humanitarian challenge. Given the scope of the challenge, scholars must examine the experiences of Venezuelan migrants to understand the needs of this population and inform efforts to foster well-being among both migrants and host nationals residing in immigrant-receiving communities. Emerging research provides insights into migration-related cultural stress experiences and mental health among Venezuelan migrants; however, prior studies have not considered the critical distinction between online xenophobia and in-person discrimination. To address this gap, we assess the psychometric properties of an abbreviated version of the Perceived Online Racism Scale (PORS) with Venezuelan migrant youth and examine the interplay between online xenophobia, in-person discrimination, and mental health.

Method: With ethical approval from the institutional review board at the lead author’s institution, the study was conducted in Bogotá and Medellín, Colombia, during the spring and summer of 2023 with Venezuelan migrant youth (N = 319; ages 13-17, 49.5% female). Participants were recruited using a referral system where initial seed participants are referred through community partners, and participants refer others to the study in exchange for additional compensation. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was used to examine the PORS, and multiple regression was conducted to examine key associations.

Results: The CFA showed excellent model fit: χ²(7) = 13.498, p = .061; CFI = .989; TLI = .977; RMSEA = .055; SRMR = .026. Controlling for demographic factors, online xenophobia was associated with depressive symptoms (β = .253, p < .001) and anxiety (β = .200, p = .001). The online xenophobia-mental health association weakened when controlling for in-person discrimination but remained nevertheless significant (depression: β = .181, p = .002, anxiety: β = .135, p = .026). Interaction effects (online*in-person) revealed a pattern in which greater exposure to online xenophobia was associated with greater distress, but only at relatively low levels of in-person discrimination.

Conclusions and Implications: The present findings provide several important contributions in terms of survey measurement and our understanding of the interplay between online and in-person cultural stressors and mental health among crisis migrant populations. The first key contribution involves psychometrically assessing a high-quality measure of online xenophobia experiences in a new language (Latin American Spanish), with a new target population (Venezuelan migrants), and in a new developmental subgroup (adolescents)—these advances help to open new and important doors in terms of research on online xenophobia and mental health. The second and third key contributions provide evidence that online xenophobia is independently related to depressive and anxiety symptoms and that this association persists even when considering in-person discrimination experiences. Finally, the fourth key finding is that online xenophobia and in-person discrimination experiences interact vis-à-vis mental health such that online exposure is linked with mental health problems, but only among youth exposed to relatively low levels of in-person discrimination.