In this project we bridge the gap between the theoretical importance of public discourse on migrants and its absence in empirical research on attitudes towards migrants. More particularly, we explore how aspects of political elite discourse and public media discourse on migrants are associated with people's attitudes towards migrants. The aims are twofold: (1) to systematically map and quantify aspects of public discourse on migrants over a period of forty five years in various European countries—focusing on both political elite discourse from party programs as well as on discourse that is “readily” available through mass and social media; (2) to use the quantitative measures developed in (1) and relate them to country-level population attitudes on migrants and “the other”. We focus on the development of issue salience and framing of discourse on migrants from 1980 to 2025 across Europe and analyze their effects on people’s attitudes. Discourse analysis is the playing field of socio-linguists usually schooled in qualitative, hermeneutic methods; survey research on
attitudes is monopolized by quantitatively oriented social scientists. This project merges the fruits of both traditions which will crucially advance our understanding of attitudes towards migrants.