The longitudinal interview data on immigrant adaptation in Finland

The longitudinal interview data were collected among a privileged group of well-educated, English-speaking Iraqis who arrived in Finland as asylum-seekers in 2015–2016 in order to study different aspects of both their short and long-term adaptation in Finland. All the interviews were conducted as semi-structured, in-depth interviews in English. In all, the data consist of a total of 36 interviews, each one lasting approximately 40–120 minutes. The participants were interviewed at three different time points during their first 2.5 years in Finland. The baseline interviews were conducted approximately 1–4 months after their arrival in Finland when all the participants (N = 22; three women) were still waiting for their asylum decision in the reception centres or private accommodation in Helsinki or Turku. They were contacted through direct contact outside reception centres, at events organised by or for asylum-seekers, or through a snowball sampling technique utilizing the participants’ social networks. The baseline data describe their life in Iraq, journey to Finland, motivation for choosing Finland, life in the reception centres as well as future expectations and so far experiences regarding their economic, psychological, socio-psychological, and socio-cultural adaptation in Finland. The two rounds of follow-up interviews were conducted approximately 1.5 years and 2.5 years after arrival among those participants (N = 7; three women) who were subsequently legally permitted to remain in Finland on the basis of either refugee status or subsidiary protection. The follow-up data were collected under the Occupational Restructuring Challenges Competencies research project funded by the Strategic Research Council at the Academy of Finland (project number 303536). The follow-up data describe, among other things, how the participants’ employment status had developed over time in Finland, and how it related to their subjective well-being as well as to both their economic and overall adaptation in the new country