Profiles of Language Brokering Experiences and Contextual Stressors: Implications for Adolescent Outcomes in Mexican Immigrant Families

Abstract

Adolescents from Mexican immigrant families are often embedded in a challenging social environment and experience multiple contextual stressors, including economic stress, discrimination, and foreigner stress. We consider how the effects of these contextual stressors may be amplified or diminished for adolescents who function as language brokers, interpreting and mediating for their English-limited parents. Using two waves of survey data collected from a sample (N = 604 at Wave 1; N = 483 at Wave 2) of Mexican American adolescents with ages ranging from 11 to 15 (M = 12.41, 54% female), four distinct brokering-stress profiles were identified. Latent profile analyses revealed that with moderate levels of contextual stress, adolescents with more positive language brokering experiences (protective group) demonstrated more favorable outcomes than those with neutral language brokering experiences (moderate group) and those who did not involve themselves as frequently in language brokering activities (less-involved group). In contrast, high levels of contextual stress, coupled with more negative language brokering experiences (risk group), produced the least favorable outcomes among adolescents.

Family Obligation, Parenting, and Adolescent Outcomes Among Mexican American Families

“…Higher mean scores reflect a greater sense of life meaning (α = .87 at W1; α = .90 at W2). A prior study has validated this scale for use with Mexican American adolescents (Kim et al, 2018)…”

“…Resilience was measured by three items from the Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale (Connor & Davidson, 2003): “I tend to recover easily after an illness or hardship,” “I can deal with whatever comes” and “I am not easily discouraged by failure.” Prior research has validated this scale for use with Mexican American adolescents (Kim et al, 2018). Adolescents reported on a scale of 1 ( strongly disagree ) to 5 ( strongly agree ), with higher scores reflecting a greater sense of resilience (α = .64 at W1; α = .73 at W2).…”

“…Resilience is particularly important to understand, as it can be considered an indicator of adolescent well-being in the context of adversity. Research on Mexican American adolescents shows that resilience can provide them with psychological strength and personal power when they are facing many risk factors (e.g., discrimination, lower socioeconomic status and difficulty with the English language; Falicov, 2014; Kim et al, 2018). Moreover, previous studies have shown that high levels of resilience are associated with a higher quality of life and positive coping strategies, whereas lower levels of resilience have been linked to higher anxiety, depression, and stress (Zolkoski & Bullock, 2012).…”

Culturally relevant stressors as moderators of intergenerational transmission of mother-adolescent executive function in Mexican immigrant families

“…Foreigner stress was assessed using a four-item scale validated among Mexican-origin adolescents (e.g., “Because of how I speak, people sometimes assume I am not a U.S. American”, Kim, Hou, et al, 2018a ). Mothers rated each item on a 5-point scale, ranging from 1 = strongly disagree to 5 = strongly agree .…”

“…As a group, low-income Mexican children of immigrants are more likely to have less-educated parents, live in poverty, and lag behind their peers on school outcomes (Tienda & Haskins, 2011 ). Mexican immigrant families also experience foreigner stress (Kim, Hou, et al, 2018a ; Zou & Cheryan, 2017 ), which is the belief that others perceive them as foreigners due to factors such as their ethnic minority status, appearance, or having an accent while speaking English (Armenta et al, 2013 ). Collectively, then, Mexican immigrants in the U.S. may be a cultural group particularly vulnerable to both economic and foreigner stress (Armenta et al, 2013 ; Kim, Schwartz, et al, 2018b ).…”