Abstract

The Relative Acculturation Extended Model (RAEM), and the Bicultural Identity Integration (BII) are the theoretical frameworks used in this study. The aim was to analyse how acculturation orientations perceived (real plane) and preferred (ideal plane) in the central and peripheral migrant adolescents life domains, were associated with the ways participants cognitively structured their bicultural identity. A group of 294 migrant adolescents living in Italy completed a questionnaire that included the adaptation of the RAEM and the BII scale. Results suggest that: 1) beside the acculturation orientations described by Berry model (assimilation, separation, marginalisation, and integration), migrant adolescents adopt and desire to adopt an orientation that is sensitive to life domains reflecting an option of maintenance of the original culture in central domains and a simultaneous adoption of the host culture in peripheral ones (alternate biculturalism); 2) integration and assimilation orientations encouraged a more overlapped bicultural identity, while separation encouraged a less overlapped and harmonic bicultural identity.