In addition to the familiar mechanisms of social inequality, ethnic origin and migration biographies are associated with special features and contextualizations that can have an additional influence on skills acquisition and educational decisions. These include, in particular, family language, relationships with the country of origin, embeddedness in ethnic communities and networks, and religious orientations.

For this reason, the National Educational Panel has a separate perspective on "Education Acquisition of Persons with Migration Background" which focuses on recording education-relevant migration-specific characteristics. One focus of this perspective on the lifelong education process is the recording of students' knowledge and competencies in the language of their parents' country of origin, since characteristics of first and second language acquisition are key explanatory dimensions for educational and labor market success.