Information behavior of migrants from Central Asia under changes in the Russian migration legislation

Abstract

The article is focused on the following questions: how and by what means migrants learn about the changes in migration legislation; what factors affect the level of migrants’ awareness about the changes; what information channels are effective, or vice versa lead to misunderstanding of the law. The authors carried out a mixed method research that included an online survey of international migrants (N = 2412) and an anthropological fieldwork in three Russian regions. The paper describes the channels through which migrants get knowledge about the changes in the legislation. The most effective channel is browsing migration-related websites, whereas discussing the legislative changes with friends may lead to misunderstanding about the law. The authors argue that a latent factor that determines a migrant’s proper information behavior is his/her «maturity» defined by age and migration experience. However, this phe- nomenon needs further theoretical and empirical examination.