Woodrow-Lafield, Karen A. 1996. “Beyond the Point of Return? Determinants of Legalized Immigrants' Intentions to Stay,” Presented at the 1996 annual meeting of the American Sociological Association, New York City. Abstract.


The "forgotten" portion of international migration to the United States is emigration, including return migration to origin countries. Its magnitude is significant, but demographic analyses can neither quantify emigration from the United States with certainty nor portray the processes culminating in emigration rather than continued settlement. In lieu of analyzing an immigrant cohort's longitudinal experiences in settlement and emigration, this research more expediently focuses on modelling the determinants of intended stay in the United States upon retirement. The analytic cohort is an exceptional one for which we would expect greater commitment to reside in the United States than for newly arrived immigrants. The models incorporate both individual-level and family-level influences on the stated intention to ultimately settle in the United States.