“Acculturation” Concept as a Key for Migration Studies

Acculturation means the changes in the original cultural characteristics of two or more different cultural groups which have a constant and direct relationship with each other. One of the most common causes of acculturation is migrations. With the acculturation process, immigrant groups are subject to a change in many aspects like physical, biological, economic, social and cultural. The main factors affecting acculturation process are as follows: various characteristics of the countries abandoned and settled, attitudes of citizens towards immigrants, social support provided to immigrants, similarities and differences between the cultures of the two countries, reasons and motivations to migrate, new positions of the immigrants and their personal characteristics.