Experiences of Racism, Racial/Ethnic Attitudes, Motivated Fairness and Mental Health Outcomes Among Primary and Secondary School Students

Abstract

While studies investigating the health effects of racial discrimination for children and youth have examined a range of effect modifiers, to date, relationships between experiences of racial discrimination, student attitudes, and health outcomes remain unexplored. This study uniquely demonstrates the moderating effects of vicarious racism and motivated fairness on the association between direct experiences of racism and mental health outcomes, specifically depressive symptoms and loneliness, among primary and secondary school students. Across seven schools, 263 students (54.4% female), ranging from 8 to 17 years old (M = 11.2, SD = 2.2) reported attitudes about other racial/ethnic groups and experiences of racism. Students from minority ethnic groups (determined by country of birth) reported higher levels of loneliness and more racist experiences relative to the majority group students. Students from the majority racial/ethnic group reported higher levels of loneliness and depressive symptoms if they had more friends from different racial/ethnic groups, whereas the number of friends from different groups had no effect on minority students' loneliness or depressive symptoms. Direct experiences of racism were robustly related to higher loneliness and depressive symptoms in multivariate regression models. However, the association with depressive symptoms was reduced to marginal significance when students reported low motivated fairness. Elaborating on the negative health effects of racism in primary and secondary school students provides an impetus for future research and the development of appropriate interventions.

Attitudes of Classroom Teachers to Cultural Diversity and Multicultural Education in Country New South Wales, Australia

“…Australia schools are the most common setting in which children and adolescents experience racism (Mansouri et al, 2009;Priest et al, 2014), defined as behaviour and practices acting to generate avoidable and unfair treatment of groups of people because of their race, ethnicity, culture or religion (Berman & Paradies, 2010). Mansouri et al (2009) found that racist name-calling affected 38 per cent of respondents among high school students in Australia's east coast states and in the Northern Territory.…”

O quesito raça/cor nos estudos de caracterização de usuários de Centro de Atenção Psicossocial

“…Kwate and Goodman (2015) call attention to methodological difficulty in proving the association between exposure to racism and the development of mental disorders with longitudinal section studies, which makes these studies expensive. However, the experience of racism has proven association with feelings of loneliness among young people (Priest et al, 2014), days of poor mental health (Kwate;Goodman, 2015) and symptoms of anxiety and depression (Pieterse et al, 2012).…”

Ethnic Harassment and Immigrant Youth's Engagement in Violent Behaviors: Understanding the Risk Factors

“…However, recent studies suggest that a substantial number of youth are treated badly and victimized due to their ethnic or cultural background at school (e.g., Bayram € Ozdemir & Stattin, 2014;Verkuyten & Thijs, 2002). Such negative experiences jeopardize the integration of immigrant adolescents into the host society (Marks, Ejesi, McCullough, & Garc ıa Coll, 2015) and have negative consequences for their psychological functioning, such as negative self-perception (Bayram € Ozdemir & Stattin, 2014), elevated anxiety, stress, and depressive symptoms (Hoglund & Hosan, 2013;McKenney, Pepler, Craig, & Connolly, 2006), and feelings of loneliness (Priest, Perry, Ferdinand, Paradies, & Kelaher, 2014).…”