Working Paper AuGuST 2008

The Timing of Naturalization 

in the United States through 1996:

The Experience of the Legal Immigrant 

Cohorts of 1977 and 1982

1

NANCy RyTINA

Recent increases in the number of legal immigrants becoming U.S. citizens have sparked interest 

in whether changes are also occurring in naturalization rates. Increases in naturalization rates 

may reflect greater social and cultural integration among immigrants and affect future levels of 

immigration through the right of citizens to sponsor close relatives for admission. Relatively little 

information, however, is available on the propensity of immigrants to naturalize. Measures such 

as the proportion of the foreign-born population that is naturalized, commonly calculated from 

cross-sectional data, are not based on the population at risk to naturalize and therefore do not 

indicate the frequency at which immigrants are naturalizing.

The administrative records of the Immigration and 

Naturalization Service (INS) are the only source of 

national data on the naturalization of same-year admission 

or cohorts of legal immigrants. This study uses INS data 

to examine factors associated with the timing of the 

naturalization decision through 1996 of legal immi-

grants admitted to the U.S. in fiscal years 1977 and 

1982. The naturalization experience of these cohorts, 

though incomplete, includes 19 years for the earlier and 

14 years for the later group. By 1996, 51 percent of the 

1977 cohort and 46 percent of the 1982 cohort had 

become U.S. citizens. The results will provide a baseline 

from which to compare the naturalization experiences 

of later immigrant cohorts.

CORRELATES OF TIMING

To naturalize, legal immigrants must meet a number of 

requirements. These include: having reached 18 years of 

age, having resided in the U.S. for at least 5 years 

(3 years for spouses of U.S. citizens and 4 years for 

refugees),

2

 having knowledge of English, U.S. history 

and civics, and possessing good moral character. The 

benefits of naturalization include identity as an American 

as well as the right to sponsor close relatives for legal 

immigration, the right to vote and the right to work in 

certain jobs available only to U.S. citizens. Deterrents to 

naturalizing include the possible loss of foreign citizen-

ship and the costs associated with the U.S. naturalization 

process – e.g., passing English language and other 

knowledge tests. 

Immigrants who naturalize shortly after meeting the 

residency requirement are presumably more interested 

in becoming integrated into U.S. society and less 

attached to their country of origin than immigrants 

who wait longer or do not naturalize. Accordingly, 

immigrant characteristics expected to be associated with 

early naturalization include young age at immigration; 

English language fluency; high levels of educational 

attainment, occupational status, earnings and income; 

admission to the United States in refugee or asylee status; 

and coming from countries distant from the United 

States or with low per capita income. Conversely, the 

decision to naturalize late or not at all would be expected 

among immigrants who are less fluent in English, have 

lower levels of schooling and fewer job skills, or who 

do not want to relinquish their current citizenship. 

1 Originally issued as Working Paper 98-1, Working Paper Series in INS Statistics, U.S. 

Immigration and Naturalization Service, August, 1998. 

2 Refugees admitted under the Cuban Adjustment Act of 1966, including most refugees 

in the 1977 cohort, are estimated to have an admission date of 30 months prior to their 

actual date of admission which means they were eligible for naturalization in less than 

3 years. Refugees admitted since the Refugee Act of 1980, including those in the 1982 

cohort, are eligible to naturalize in 4 years because the one-year of residence spent prior 

to adjustment of status is counted toward the residency requirement.

Office of Immigration Statistics

POLICy DIRECTORATE
0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

1977

1977

1980 1982

1982

1984 1986 1988 1990 1992 1994 1996

Source: U. S. Department of Homeland Security.

Figure 1.

Cumulative Naturalization Rates through 1996:

Legal Immigrant Cohorts of 1977 and 1982

Percent

2 DHS Office of Immigration Statistics

Jasso and Rosenzweig (1995) compared the timing of naturalization among certain immigrants admitted in 1977 based on marital 

status (married to U.S. citizens) and occupational skills. They found 

that the latter were more likely to have naturalized by 1990 than 

the former although the former were more likely to naturalize 

during the first five years after obtaining permanent resident status. 

These findings have limited applicability because the analysis was 

restricted to male immigrants from Eastern Hemisphere countries 

who were aged 21-59 when admitted in 1977 – less than 10 percent 

of all immigrants in that age range in 1977. By examining the 

propensity to naturalize across all categories of admission for two 

same-year immigrant cohorts and extending the naturalization 

time horizon to 1996, the results of this analysis should have 

greater generality.

DATA AND METHOD

Data were obtained from INS administrative records on 351,935 

immigrants ages 16 and over in fiscal year 1977 and 447,854 in 

1982. INS collects information each year on aliens who become 

legal immigrants and on legal immigrants who naturalize. Matching 

the immigrant and naturalization records for aliens granted legal 

permanent residence makes it possible to determine if an immigrant naturalized and if so, to calculate his or her duration in 

immigrant status. INS has updated the naturalization rates of the 

1977 and 1982 cohorts every few years and published summary 

findings in the annual Statistical Yearbook. 

For this study, personal and immigrant characteristics examined 

include: age at immigration, gender, marital status at immigration, 

region of birth, occupation at immigration, immigrant classification at admission, and the date of naturalization for those who 

became U.S. citizens. Country of origin characteristics include GNP 

per capita (Population Reference Bureau, 1978) and whether or 

not English was the official language (World Almanac, 1979–

1984). INS does not collect data on socioeconomic characteristics, 

such as education or income, either at the time of immigration 

or naturalization. 

The post-immigration period was divided into 5 segments (4 for 

the 1982 cohort). Each segment represents the difference between 

the year of naturalization and the year of admission to legal 

permanent residence:

1) 5 years or less,

2) 6 to 10 years,

3) 11 to 15 years,

4) 16 or more years (1977 cohort only), 

5) never naturalized (not naturalized by the end of 1996).

For each cohort, a multinomial logit model was used to estimate 

the effect of the personal, immigrant, and country of origin characteristics, all dummy variables except GNP per capita, on the odds 

of naturalizing within each post-immigration interval.3

 Response 

categories included naturalizing: in 5 years or less compared to 

not naturalizing, in 6-10 years compared to not naturalizing, in 

11-15 years compared to not naturalizing, and, for the 1977 

cohort, in 16 or more years compared to not naturalizing. 

FINDINGS

Overview

The cumulative naturalization rates for the 1977 and 1982 cohorts 

follow a similar pattern. About one-third of each cohort naturalized after ten years in immigrant status (see Figure 1). Many 

observers agree that the acceleration in naturalization rates during 

the1990s is at least partly attributable to legislative efforts to 

reduce public benefits for legal immigrants. 

The median duration in immigrant status in 1996 was 7 years for 

the 1977 cohort and 6 years for the 1982 cohort (see Figure 2). 

The slightly higher duration for the 1977 cohort may be due to its 

greater number of years of naturalization eligibility. The medians 

for both cohorts will rise until naturalizations eventually cease. 

Cumulative naturalization rates for each cohort are limited 

primarily by emigration. Annual estimates of emigration for 

immigrants in 1973 range from a low of 2 percent for Chinese to 

a high of nearly 17 percent for Colombians (Liang, 1994).

The distribution of personal characteristics by time spent in each 

post-immigration interval is generally similar for the two cohorts. 

The leading country of birth was Cuba (16 percent) for the 1977 

cohort and Vietnam (11 percent) for the 1982 cohort. The second 

and third leading countries for both cohorts were the Philippines 

and Mexico (Tables 1 and 2). Family and employment preference 

3 The Cox proportional hazard model is an alternative procedure that can be used to estimate the timing 

of naturalization. A central assumption of this technique is that the ratio of the estimated hazard functions for two observations with particular values on the independent variables remain constant over 

time. Diagnostic testing, however, revealed that this assumption was violated for both cohorts covered 

by this analysis. For this reason, the multinomial logit model, which does not rely on a proportionality 

assumption, was preferred. 
0

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

1977

1982

Source: U. S. Department of Homeland Security.

Figure 2.

Duration in Legal Immigrant Status through 1996:

1977 and 1982 Legal Immigrant Cohorts

Percent

Years In Immigrant Status

< 1 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19

DHS Office of Immigration Statistics 3

immigrants accounted for a greater proportion of the total in 

1982 than 1977 (42 percent vs. 32 percent) probably because up 

until 1978 few preference visas were available for Western 

Hemisphere immigrants.

Multinomial Logit Estimates

Naturalized versus not naturalized. Consistent with expectations, the probability of having naturalized by 1996 was greatest 

among 1977 immigrants who were refugees, under age 45 at 

admission, born in Asian countries, and employed at the time of 

immigration, especially in professional, managerial, sales or clerical 

positions (Table 3). Refugees admitted in 1977 were nearly five 

times as likely to become citizens as were immediate relatives of 

U.S. citizens.

With few exceptions, similar patterns are observed for the 1982 

immigrant cohort, thus suggesting some constancy across cohorts 

in factors associated with the naturalization decision (Table 4). 

Partly due to changes in the class of admission categories between 

1977 and 1982, refugees in 1982 were only slightly more likely 

to naturalize than immigrants admitted under other categories. 4 

And, European born immigrants (many from the former Soviet 

Union) were nearly as likely as Asians to naturalize.

Gender, marital status, and country of origin had little effect on 

the probability of naturalization for either cohort. However, 1982 

immigrants born in countries where English was the official 

language were more likely to naturalize than immigrants from 

other countries. 

Early versus late naturalization. For each cohort, the selectivity 

associated with naturalization faded (odds ratios approach 1.00) 

as the post-immigration interval increased. This suggests that 

factors determined by the time of immigration – all the variables 

in this analysis--have less impact on the decision to naturalize than 

experiences in the U.S. when that decision occurs many years later. 

The ‘fade’ effect is also consistent with the view that legislative 

efforts to reduce public benefits for legal immigrants may have 

increased the naturalization rate of older immigrants.

For the most part, the factors associated with naturalization timing 

in this paper are similar for the two cohorts with odds-ratios in 

the expected direction. Age at immigration greatly increased the 

odds of naturalizing early. For both cohorts, immigrants ages 

16–24 were more than 7 times as likely as immigrants ages 45 

and over to naturalize within the first five years of immigration. 

Refugees were more likely to naturalize early than immigrants 

admitted under other categories. This effect was pronounced 

among the 1977 cohort. As noted, the results for the 1982 cohort 

are not entirely comparable because of changes in the composition of the admission categories. For both cohorts, immigrants 

born in Asian countries were three times as likely to naturalize 

within the first 10 years as North American born immigrants. The 

Asian effect is less noticeable for immigrants who naturalized later 

(after 10 years), many of whom were Mexican born. 

Immigrants in professional, managerial, sales and clerical occupations were more than twice as likely to naturalize early relative to 

nonworkers as those employed in precision production, operative, 

laborer occupations, and service occupations. This presumably 

reflects the effects of higher education and income among the 

former than the latter.

The country of origin variables had smaller effects on naturalization timing. Immigrants from countries where English was the 

official language were more likely to naturalize than other immigrants up until the early 1990s (16 or more years duration for the 

1977 cohort and 11-15 years for the 1982 cohort). GNP per capita 

had almost no effect but this may be partly attributable to its 

collinear relationship with English as the official language. 

Gender and marital status generally had little impact on the timing 

of naturalization. Married immigrants in the 1977 cohort were 

more likely than other immigrants to naturalize early probably 

because many were spouses of U.S. citizens with a 3-year 

residency requirement.

CONCLuSIONS

This study examined factors affecting the timing of naturalization 

through 1996 for the legal immigrant cohorts of 1977 and 1982. 

The results indicate that immigrants in the late 1970s and early 

1980s were most likely to naturalize, and naturalize early, if they 

were admitted as refugees, were young, and born in Asian countries. While these findings do not contradict those of Jasso and 

4 Most of ‘other’ in 1977 was allocated to employment and family preferences by 1982. This left ’other’ 

as a very small category in 1982; close to one-half were foreign medical doctors of whom 85 percent 

had naturalized by 1996.
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1 U.S. citizens

4 DHS Office of Immigration Statistics

Rosenzweig (1995), they suggest that the employment versus 

family basis for admission for legal permanent residence is but 

one of many factors affecting naturalization propensities. Analysis 

of more recent immigrant cohorts will shed light on whether the 

current results hold despite compositional shifts in the legal 

immigrant population toward aliens of Mexican origin. The fact 

that the odds of naturalizing for factors included in this study 

faded as time in the post-immigration period increased clearly 

points to the need for additional data on the U.S. portion of immigrant experience to more fully explain the decision to naturalize.

REFERENCES

Jasso, G. and M. Rosenzweig. 1990. The New Chosen People: Immigrants in 

the United States. New York: Russell Sage Foundation. 

_______. 1995. “Do Immigrants Screened for Skills Do Better than 

Family Reunification Immigrants?” International Migration Review

29:85-111.

Liang, Zai. 1994. “On the Measurement of Naturalization.” Demography

31: 525-48.

Population Reference Bureau. 1978. 1978 World Population Data Sheet.

Washington, DC. 

World Almanac. 1979-1984. The World Almanac and Book of Facts.

Mahway, NJ: Funk and Wagnalls. 

Table 1.

Characteristics of 1977 Legal Immigrant Cohort by Timing of Naturalization through 1996

Characteristic at immigration

Naturalized-years in immigrant status Not

5 or less 6 to 10 11 to 15 16 or more Total naturalized Total

Total 29,315 87,541 22,973 39,998 179,827 172,108 351,935

Percent 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0

Age

18 to 24 years 31.3 31.3 34.4 20.6 29.3 23.9 26.7

25 to 34 years 35.8 39.9 36.8 25.9 35.7 30.1 33.0

35 to 44 years 17.3 15.5 15.1 21.9 17.2 14.2 15.7

45 to 54 years 9.4 7.6 8.7 18.4 10.4 10.1 10.3

55 to 64 years 4.0 4.2 3.8 9.9 5.4 9.9 7.6

65 years and over 2.2 1.5 1.1 3.3 2.0 11.9 6.8

Gender

Female 55.0 52.2 53.2 59.4 54.4 54.2 54.3

Male 45.0 47.8 46.8 40.6 45.6 45.8 45.7

Country of birth

Vietnam 38.1 7.6 12.7 33.1 18.9 13.4 16.2

Philippines 12.4 15.7 8.8 2.8 11.4 6.5 9.0

Mexico 1.3 3.6 6.9 10.0 5.1 12.7 8.8

Korea 7.9 8.4 5.0 4.1 6.9 4.3 5.6

India 3.0 6.4 5.5 4.3 5.2 3.2 4.3

Other 37.2 58.3 61.1 45.7 52.4 60.0 56.1

Class of admission

Employment preference 4.6 8.6 5.0 3.0 6.2 3.7 5.0

Family preference 14.2 40.9 30.5 19.2 30.4 23.1 26.8

Immediate relative of USC1 33.2 18.1 22.2 16.8 20.8 31.5 26.0

Refugee/Asylee 40.7 11.6 14.8 33.8 21.7 14.5 18.1

Other 7.3 20.9 27.4 27.2 20.9 27.1 24.0

Occupation

Executives, managers 5.2 6.8 5.9 4.2 5.8 5.5 5.7

Professionals 9.7 11.7 8.5 5.3 9.6 6.5 8.1

Technical support workers 4.4 6.0 3.7 2.1 4.6 2.5 3.5

Sales workers 2.3 1.6 1.6 1.4 1.7 1.5 1.6

Administrative support 8.7 7.3 6.6 4.8 6.9 4.6 5.8

Precision production 4.9 5.7 6.3 6.8 5.9 6.2 6.0

Operatives, laborers 13.4 10.3 13.2 20.2 13.4 13.0 13.2

Service workers 5.8 6.9 7.9 8.1 7.1 7.1 7.1

Nonworkers 41.8 40.5 43.4 43.4 41.7 48.5 45.1

Farming, forestry, fisheries 0.8 1.3 1.3 1.3 1.2 3.1 2.1

Missing/Unknown 3.0 1.8 1.6 2.3 2.1 1.5 1.8

Source: U.S. Department of Homeland Security.
- Figure rounds to 0.0.

1 U.S. citizens.

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DHS Office of Immigration Statistics 5

Table 2.

Characteristics of 1982 Legal Immigrant Cohort by Timing of Naturalization through 1996

Characteristic at immigration

Naturalized-years in immigrant status Not

5 or less 6 to 10 11 to 15 Total naturalized Total

Total 53,524 106,680 44,234 204,438 243,146 447,584

Percent 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0

Age

16 to 24 years 35.7 34.4 31.6 34.1 26.9 30.2

25 to 34 years 41.0 39.9 36.0 39.4 31.5 35.1

35 to 44 years 13.7 14.7 16.0 14.7 15.6 15.2

45 to 54 years 5.5 6.4 9.4 6.8 9.6 8.3

55 to 64 years 2.9 3.5 5.3 3.7 8.4 6.3

65 years and over 1.2 1.1 1.7 1.3 8.0 4.9

Gender

Female 45.7 46.4 50.1 47.0 49.3 48.2

Male 51.9 49.3 46.4 49.4 46.5 47.8

Missing 2.5 4.2 3.5 3.6 4.2 3.9

Country of birth

Vietnam 28.5 11.9 13.6 16.6 6.5 11.1

Mexico 2.1 3.2 7.9 3.9 13.9 9.4

Philippines 12.4 13.6 4.7 11.4 5.3 8.0

China 4.6 8.2 3.8 6.3 4.3 5.2

Korea 4.1 5.0 4.0 4.5 5.6 5.1

Other 48.3 58.2 66.0 57.3 64.3 61.1

Class of admission

Employment preference 4.7 12.9 8.7 9.9 7.9 8.8

Family preference 12.7 42.7 36.7 33.6 33.2 33.4

Immediate relative of USC1 30.5 22.5 23.7 24.9 39.2 32.7

Refugee/Asylee 51.1 19.9 29.6 30.2 18.2 23.6

Other 0.9 2.0 1.3 1.6 1.4 1.5

Occupation

Executives, managers 3.1 5.1 3.7 4.3 4.6 4.4

Professionals 10.9 12.5 7.5 11.0 6.8 8.7

Technical support workers 2.4 1.7 1.1 1.7 0.9 1.3

Sales workers 1.2 1.3 1.2 1.3 1.2 1.2

Administrative support 5.3 5.5 4.8 5.3 4.2 4.7

Precision production 4.4 4.1 4.9 4.3 4.8 4.6

Operatives, laborers 9.2 8.5 12.0 9.5 12.4 11.1

Service workers 6.1 6.6 7.3 6.6 6.7 6.7

Nonworkers 49.9 45.7 49.7 47.6 49.0 48.4

Farming, forestry, fisheries 1.5 2.5 2.0 2.1 3.2 2.7

Missing/Unknown 6.0 6.5 6.0 6.3 6.2 6.2

Source: U.S. Department of Homeland Security.
6 DHS Office of Immigration Statistics

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1 Reference categories shown in italics.

2 U.S. citizen.

3 Odds-ratios round to 1.00.

Table 3. 

Multinomial Logit Estimates of Timing of Naturalization through 1996 for 1977 Legal Immigrant Cohort

Characteristic at immigration1

Odds Ratios

Naturalized 

0-20 years vs. 

not naturalized

Naturalized in 

0-5 years vs. 

not naturalized

Naturalized in 

6-10 years vs. 

not naturalized

Naturalized in 

11-15 years vs. 

not naturalized

Naturalized in 

16 years or more vs. 

not naturalized

Age

16 to 24 years 3.16 6.46 3.92 4.19 1.26

25 to 34 years 2.51 5.03 3.03 3.02 1.15

35 to 44 years 2.18 3.38 2.34 2.41 1.59

45 years and over

Class of admission

Refugee 4.81 8.33 4.35 2.68 3.66

Employment preference 1.64 0.59 2.16 1.43 1.66

Family preference 1.44 0.37 1.89 1.46 1.65

Other 1.34 0.33 1.80 1.40 1.49

Immediate relative of USC2

Region of birth

Asia 2.42 3.54 4.14 1.56 0.83

Europe 1.12 1.04 1.96 0.98 0.48

Other 1.65 1.56 2.15 1.60 1.20

North America

Gender

Male 0.82 0.86 0.88 0.89 0.67

Female

Marital Status

Married 1.21 1.53 1.16 1.12 1.24

Other

Occupation

Professionals, managers 1.70 2.09 1.84 1.55 1.22

Sales, clerical 1.65 2.14 1.76 1.48 1.27

Production, operatives, laborers 1.34 1.17 1.31 1.25 1.52

Service 1.44 1.32 1.53 1.42 1.41

Nonworkers, unknown

Country of origin

GNP/capita3 <1.00 <1.00 <1.00 <1.00 <1.00

English official language 1.27 1.27 1.47 1.40 0.80

Number of cases

Naturalized 178,187 29,091 86,754 22,594 39,613

Not naturalized 169,786 169,786 169,786 169,786 169,786

Note: The bar denotes two separate analyses, one for ever vs. never naturalized immigrants and the other for early to late naturalized vs. never naturalized immigrants. All odds-ratios are significant 

at the .001 level.
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DHS Office of Immigration Statistics 7

Table 4. 

Multinomial Logit Estimates of Timing of Naturalization through 1996 for 1982 Legal Immigrant Cohort

Characteristic at immigration1

Odds Ratios

Naturalized in 

0-15 vs. 

not naturalized

Naturalized in 

1-5 years vs. 

not naturalized

Naturalized in 

6-10 years vs. 

not naturalized

Naturalized in 

11-15 years vs. 

not naturalized

Age

16 to 24 years 3.65 5.73 3.99 2.01

25 to 34 years 3.11 5.02 3.24 1.84

35 to 44 years 2.09 3.04 2.11 1.46

45 years and over

Class of admission

Refugee 1.68 1.89 1.11 2.56

Employment preference 1.57 0.47 2.28 1.81

Family preference 1.19 0.33 1.61 1.55

Other 1.60 0.68 2.22 1.47

Immediate relative of USC2

Region of birth

Asia 2.70 5.27 3.54 1.02

Europe 2.39 7.23 2.25 0.94

Other 2.02 2.39 2.35 1.49

North America

Gender

Male 0.96 0.97 1.00 0.87

Female

Marital Status

Married 1.09 1.04 1.07 1.17

Other

Occupation

Professionals, managers 1.70 2.49 1.61 1.24

Sales, clerical 1.54 2.11 1.49 1.19

Production, operatives, laborers 1.04 1.10 1.00 1.03

Service 1.27 1.31 1.29 1.17

Nonworkers, unknown

Country of origin

GNP/capita3 <1.00 <1.00 <1.00 <1.00

English official language 1.40 1.42 1.49 1.12

Number of cases

Naturalized 201,370 53,065 104,900 43,226

Not naturalized. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 233,912 233,912 233,912 233,912

Note: The bar denotes two separate analyses, one for ever vs. never naturalized immigrants and the other for early to late naturalized vs. never naturalized immigrants. 

All odds-ratios are significant at the .001 level.

1 Reference categories in italics.

2 U.S. citizen.

3 Odds-ratios round to 1.00.