Family ethnic socialization predicts better academic outcomes via proactive coping with discrimination and increased self‐efficacy

Abstract

As the U.S. Latino youth population grows, understanding how family and individual resources may promote Latino adolescents' academic outcomes is important. The current investigation examined whether family ethnic socialization predicted adolescents' use of proactive strategies for coping with ethnic-racial discrimination and examined a potential pathway through which these contextual and individual resources may relate to educational outcomes. Drawing on data from a sample of Latino adolescents (n = 321; Mage = 15.31 years, SD = .76; 49.5% female), results of a cross-sectional structural equation model showed a double mediation of the relation between family ethnic socialization and GPA by proactive coping strategies and self-efficacy. Alternate models, limitations of the current investigation, and implications for future research are discussed.Latinos comprise almost a quarter of the current U.S. youth population, with projections indicating that Latinos will account for 34 percent of the youth population by 2060 (Colby & Ortman, 2015). As Latino students constitute a significant and increasingly more significant share of the nation's future, ensuring that they are academically well-prepared for the workforce is important for the U.S. to thrive on a global level. Although the dropout rate has decreased over the past two decades, Latino students in the U.S. drop out of school at a rate two times higher than their White counterparts (Gramlich, 2017). These educational disparities could be related to Latino youths' experiences with ethnic-racial discrimination (e.g., prejudiced comments, negative stereotypes, and negative actions toward individuals based on their ethnic group membership; Brondolo, Ver Halen, Pencille, Beatty, & Contrada, 2009). Latino adolescents report a high prevalence of experiences with ethnic-racial discrimination (Flores, Tschann, Dimas, Pasch, & de Groat, 2010), and these experiences are negatively related to their academic achievement (e.g., Huynh & Fuligni, 2010;McWhirter, Garcia, & Bines, 2017).Indeed, consistent with theoretical notions advanced in the Phenomenological Variant of Ecological Systems Theory (PVEST; Spencer, Dupree, & Hartmann, 1997), repeat exposure to discriminatory experiences during adolescence may form patterns of responses that shape developmental trajectories and identities via self-system processes. However, adolescents' proactive coping strategies (i.e., strategies through which they actively engage in efforts to resolve stressors) may mitigate the effects of discrimination (Pascoe & Smart Richman, 2009) and these coping responses may in turn be incorporated into adolescents' emerging identities (Spencer et al., 1997). In fact, research shows that proactive coping strategies are positively related to adolescents' self-esteem, ethnic-racial identity, and positive affect (Dumont & Provost, 1999; Vera et al., 2012). It is especially important to understand the mechanisms underlying adolescents' approaches for coping proactively with discrimination due to the negative...

Ethnic-Racial Socialization among Latinx Families: A Systematic Review of the Literature

“…It shows that ERS can buffer the effect of discrimination (Carranza 2007;Ayón 2016). It also shows that ERS is related to ethnic identity development (Quintana and Vera 1999;Hughes et al 2009;Rivas-Drake et al 2009;Knight et al 2011Knight et al , 2017Umaña-Taylor 2015, 2016;Else-Quest and Morse 2015;White et al 2018;Christophe et al 2019;Wang et al 2019), academic adjustment (Huynh and Fuligni 2008;Berkel et al 2010;Calzada et al 2012;McGill et al 2012;Umaña-Taylor et al 2014;Caughy and Owen 2015;Rivas-Drake and Marchand 2016;Kim et al 2018;McDermott et al 2018), mental health (Phinney and Chavira 1995;Derlan et al 2015;Espinoza et al 2016;Padilla et al 2016;Santiago et al 2016;Wang and Benner 2016;Gonzales-Backen et al 2017;Chen et al 2019;Park et al 2019), and behavioral health (Grindal and Nieri 2016;Nieri et al 2019;Zapolski and Clifton 2019).…”

“…Similarly, among 15-year-olds, cultural socialization was associated with more proactive coping, which in turn was associated with greater self-efficacy. Greater self-efficacy was in turn associated with higher grade point averages (McDermott, Umaña-Taylor, and Fuentes-Martinez 2018). Among older adolescents (eleventh graders), cultural socialization was positively associated with academic achievement and motivation (Huynh and Fuligni 2008).…”

Ethnic–Racial Socialization in the Family: A Decade's Advance on Precursors and Outcomes

“…In contrast to the state of the literature in 2006 as outlined by D. Hughes et al (), a review of the literature in the 2010 decade revealed a significant empirical base from which to conclude that a robust and positive association exists between cultural socialization and multiple indicators of positive youth development (see Table ). Findings for this dimension of ethnic–racial socialization overwhelmingly supported cultural socialization as a promotive factor via its positive associations with many indicators of youths' adjustment such as ethnic–racial identity (e.g., Brittian, Umaña‐Taylor, & Derlan, ; Hernández, Conger, Robins, Bacher, & Widaman, ), self‐esteem (e.g., Gonzales‐Backen, Bámaca‐Colbert, Noah, & Rivera, ), academic adjustment (e.g., Banerjee, Harrell, & Johnson, ; Bravo, Umaña‐Taylor, Guimond, Updegraff, & Jahromi, ; Rivas‐Drake & Marchand, ), adaptive coping (e.g., Blackmon, Coyle, Davenport, Owens, & Sparrow, ; McDermott, Umaña‐Taylor, & Martinez‐Fuentes, ), and psychological well‐being (e.g., Nguyen, Wong, Juang, & Park, ). Furthermore, only two of the 236 articles found negative associations and five reported mixed findings, supporting the observations made by D. Hughes et al () that this domain of ethnic–racial socialization was consistently associated with positive outcomes.…”

Ethnic Socialization, Ethnic Identity, and Self-Esteem in Chinese Mulao Adolescents

“…Previous studies mainly adopted the whole perspective when considering the influence of ethnic socialization and viewed it as one latent variable (Supple et al, 2006;Lee et al, 2018;McDermott et al, 2018). However, considering multidimensional ethnic socialization, different ethnic messages may have different correlations with ethnic identity.…”