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7/15/2006 12:05:00 AM

A lengthy study of Houstonians reveals growing pessimism about the country’s future and increasing wariness of immigration and diversity. Skyrocketing immigration and the shift from a blue-collar to a white-collar economy -- economic and demographic trends currently affecting the United States -- have heavily influenced Houston over the last 25 years. Recent results of the annual city survey, conducted by Rice University since 1982, suggest how these trends could affect the rest of the nation going forward.

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The Houston Area Survey (HAS) was launched just months before oil prices collapsed in 1982 and has been conducted every year since. In the ensuing quarter century, Houston has transformed from a biracial city dominated by Anglos, with its economy inextricably linked to the East Texas oil fields, to a multiethnic city reliant on a knowledge-based economy. As the only known longitudinal study of its kind, this research out of Rice University has provided a systematic look at how America’s fourth-largest city is responding to these ongoing transformations.

“Because its changing demographics are three years ahead of the rest of Texas and about three decades ahead of the country, the American future is happening right here and now in Houston,” said Stephen Klineberg, author of the study and a professor of sociology at Rice University. “So how well Houston can navigate the transition into becoming a truly inclusive multiethnic society will have enormous significance not just for Houston’s future, but for America’s future.”

At the time of the 2000 U.S. Census, Harris County was 42 percent Anglo, 18 percent black, 33 percent Hispanic and 6.5 percent Asian/others -- a far cry from the 74 percent Anglo community of 1960 or the 63 percent Anglo community of 1980.

Using identical questions across the years, the study reaches roughly 650 people annually, and the 2006 findings reveal some particularly significant shifts in opinion on the country, immigration and ethnic diversity. From 1996 to 2004, the surveys recorded consistently more positive attitudes toward the region’s burgeoning diversity. In response to a question about whether increasing ethnic diversity in Houston will eventually become a source of great strength or a growing problem for the city, the percentage giving positive responses grew to 69 percent in 2004, from 57 percent in 1996. This year, the upward trend stopped abruptly, with just 60 percent still viewing the city’s diversity as a great strength.

In addition, 58 percent of this year’s respondents agreed that the U.S. should take action to reduce the number of new immigrants coming into the country, up from 48 percent in 2004. More generally, the latest survey saw a jump of 14 percentage points in the number who believe the country is “headed for more difficult times” versus “headed for better times” -- 68 percent, compared with 54 percent in 2005.

“These results show a shift from the optimism of previous years -- a reversal of the public’s increasingly positive views about immigration, and a new pessimism that is echoed in national polls,” said Klineberg, noting the survey was conducted in February and March, before immigration became such a hot-button topic this spring.

Klineberg said that what is significant about the HAS in comparison to national polls is that it provides a clear historical and geographic context for understanding the public’s changing “constructions of reality,” a perspective that is more difficult to achieve in national surveys.

Despite the recent pessimistic downturn, Klineberg still thinks that because of Houston’s openness, “can-do” spirit and sheer geographic size, the area has a better chance to build a successful multiethnic society than other cities that are going through similar changes, such as New York and Los Angeles. The region’s sprawling low-density topography allows the various ethnic communities to develop somewhat independently and reduces the conflicts that come from being forced to interact in a more confined space.

In addition to the 2006 findings, the HAS illuminates other trends taking shape over several years. Among the most significant are an increase in the perceived importance of a college education (a poignant marker of the shift from the blue-collar world into a high-tech, knowledge-based economy), a growing concern over the gap between rich and poor, declining support for the death penalty and increasing acceptance of gay rights.

Using traditional random-digit dialing methods, the 2006 study had a sampling error of +/-3.5 percent.

Klineberg received a Ph.D. in social psychology from Harvard University. After teaching at Princeton, he joined Rice University’s sociology department in 1972. He’s currently at work on a book that will cover the first quarter century of the Houston studies.

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For more information, contact Stephen Klineberg at slk@rice.edu or B.J. Almond in the Office of News and Media Relations at balmond@rice.edu.