Critical, active, and well adapted: Antecedents and consequences of adolescents' critical consciousness profiles.

This preregistered study aimed to identify antecedents and consequences of adolescents' critical consciousness (CC) profiles with person-centered approaches based on data from 663 ethnically diverse German adolescents collected from 2017 to 2019 (Mage = 12.91, 50% male, 50% female). Latent profile analyses of adolescents' critical reflection and interpersonal and structural critical action intentions yielded three profiles: "uncritical," "armchair activists," and "actionists." Discrimination experiences, but not CC classroom climate, predicted a higher likelihood of being in the armchair activist or actionist profiles. The actionist profile showed better, but the armchair activist profile worse socioemotional and academic adaptation cross-sectionally and over time (vs. the other profiles). The results highlight the potential of person-centered approaches and of fostering developmentally appropriate forms of critical action among adolescents in novel contexts.

Ethnic-Racial Identity and Attitude Change: Assessments of Outgroup and Diversity Attitudes among Adolescents in Sweden.

Outgroup and diversity attitudes are important components of intercultural understanding and well-being. Despite the potential of ethnic-racial identity development as a means to foster positive outgroup and diversity attitudes, little is known about its effectiveness in rapidly diversifying contexts such as Sweden. This pre-registered study filled this gap by examining if adolescents taking part in an intervention focused on ethnic-racial identity exploration, the Identity Project, also reported change in outgroup and diversity attitudes, and whether migration background, education type, and ethnic-racial identity development predicted such change. Twenty-three tenth-grade classes in Sweden (N = 509; Mage = 16.28; SDage = 0.80; 66% female; 51% migration background) participated in the intervention and were assessed in four waves over a period of 26 weeks. Whereas ethnic-racial identity exploration and resolution increased for the intervention group, the adolescents reported no change in outgroup and diversity attitudes when compared to a control group. Increases in ethnic-racial identity exploration and resolution co-varied with increases in attitudes, but only at Time 3. The results do not provide support for the link between ethnic-racial identity development and positive outgroup and diversity attitudes, and challenge the notion of attitude change as a cascading effect of the Identity Project intervention in non-US sociocultural contexts. All aspects of the study were pre-registered on the Open Science Framework platform ( https://osf.io/f5896 ).

Promoting Adolescents' Heritage Cultural Identity Development: Exploring the Role of Autonomy and Relatedness Satisfaction in School-Based Interventions.

Given the significance of heritage cultural identity for optimal adolescent development, it is imperative to investigate factors influencing the efficacy of interventions aimed at promoting heritage cultural identity. Using latent profile cluster analysis and multinomial logistic regressions, this longitudinal study examined how autonomy and relatedness need satisfaction at school (1) related to heritage cultural identity development trajectories, and (2) moderated effects of a school-based intervention. The study included N = 198 adolescents (Mage = 12.86 years, SDage = 0.75, 52% female, 41% immigrant descent, 49% intervention group) in Germany. Teacher-student relationships played an important role in facilitating intervention effects on identity development trajectories, emphasizing the importance of the relational context when implementing school-based interventions to promote heritage cultural identity development.

Evaluating a School-Based Intervention on Adolescents' Ethnic-racial Identity in Sweden.

Finding developmentally appropriate ways to support youth in understanding their own ethnic-racial identity is needed, particularly in contexts like Sweden where such support is not the norm. This preregistered longitudinal study examined whether an 8-week school-based intervention, the Identity Project, impacted youth ethnic-racial identity exploration (participation and search), resolution, private regard, and centrality. Participants were 509 adolescents in the 10th grade (Mage = 16.28, SD = 0.80; 65% self-identified girls; 52% minoritized ethnic background), who were randomized into an intervention or wait-list control group and assessed at baseline and three times post-intervention. The findings indicated an initial and simultaneous effect of the intervention only for exploration participation and resolution but did not show the expected chain of effects with earlier exploration predicting later resolution. Growth models indicated a greater increase in exploration participation over time for the intervention group than the control group. The findings indicate a mixed picture about the effectiveness of the intervention, with effects primarily narrowly targeted to exploration participation, but nevertheless highlight the potential for supporting Swedish youth in engaging with their ethnic-racial identities.

Promoting positive development among refugee adolescents.

Of the estimated 35.3 million refugees around the world (UNHCR, Figures at a Glance, 2022), approximately 50% are children under the age of 18. Refugee adolescents represent a unique group as they navigate developmental tasks in an unstable and often threatening environment or in resettlement contexts in which they often face marginalization. In addition to physiological, social, and psychological changes that mark adolescence, refugee youth often face traumatic experiences, acculturative stress, discrimination, and a lack of basic resources. In this consensus statement, we examine research on refugee adolescents' developmental tasks, acculturative tasks, and psychological adjustment using Suárez-Orozco and colleague's integrative risk and resilience model for immigrant-origin children and youth proposed by Suárez-Orozco et al. Finally, we discuss recommendations-moving from proximal to more distal contexts.

Critical Consciousness Socialization at School: Classroom Climate, Perceived Societal Islamophobia, and Critical Action Among Adolescents.

Schools are key contexts for the development of adolescents' critical consciousness. We explored how three dimensions of the classroom cultural diversity climate (critical consciousness, color-evasion, and multiculturalism) related to adolescents' critical reflection (i.e., perceived societal Islamophobia) and intended critical action (i.e., political activism). Our sample included adolescents experiencing high (second generation, Muslim, N = 237) versus low (non-immigrant descent, non-Muslim, N = 478) stigmatization in Germany. Multilevel analyses revealed that for both groups a critical consciousness climate, but not a color-evasive or a multicultural climate, was positively associated with perceived societal Islamophobia and intended critical action. Thus, to promote adolescents' critical consciousness, schools should go beyond emphasizing a common humanity and celebrating cultural diversity and include explicit discussions of social inequity.

Participatory science as a decolonizing methodology: Leveraging collective knowledge from partnerships with refugee and immigrant communities.

OBJECTIVES: The major global problems of our day, including mass displacement, climate change, violence, and pandemic, necessitate global solutions. In a world where injustice and inequities are rampant, psychologists stand at the precipice of social change and action, with an opportunity to unambiguously decolonize our research methodologies, and engage in scholarship that provides immediate benefits to communities. METHOD: Participatory methods offer an opportunity to co-create an empowering, equitable, inclusive, and ethical science in partnership with communities. RESULTS: This special issue on Collaborative and Participatory Research to Promote Engagement, Empowerment, and Resilience for Immigrant and Refugee Youth, Families, and Communities highlights exemplary interdisciplinary work that has emerged in learning from and working in partnership with immigrant and refugee youth, families, and communities. CONCLUSIONS: The special issue offers six major components of participatory methodologies that provide a roadmap to decolonizing psychological science, recognize the potentials for innovation and impact, and advance the field. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

The markings of linked fate among Asian Americans and Latinxs.

OBJECTIVE: Linked fate, or the degree to which individuals feel that their lives are tied to other group members' lives, can mobilize collective action and strengthen commonalities. Yet, linked fate remains underresearched, particularly among Asian Americans and Latinxs. METHOD: Using the 2016 Collaborative Multiracial Postelection Survey, the present study draws on García Coll et al.'s (1996) integrative model to examine associations between three domains of linked fate (immigrant, minority, coethnic) and demographic and structural factors (age, gender, nativity, education, income, language, skin color, neighborhood diversity, social stratification). RESULTS: Education, discrimination, and feeling excluded are positively related to immigrant, minority, and coethnic-linked fate; age is negatively related. Income and nativity were not significant predictors. CONCLUSIONS: Implications for fostering linked fate and coalition building within and across Asians and Latinxs are discussed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

Acculturation hassles and adjustment of adolescents of immigrant descent: Testing mediation with a self-determination theory approach.

Despite evidence that acculturation hassles (such as discrimination and language hassles) relate to poorer adjustment for adolescents of immigrant descent, we know less about the psychological processes underlying these associations. In this study, we test whether reduced psychological needs satisfaction in terms of a lower sense of belonging, autonomy, and competence, mediates the associations of acculturation hassles with psychological distress and academic adjustment. Our sample included 439 seventh graders from 15 schools in Germany (51% female, Mage = 12.4 years, SD = .73). Results revealed that adolescents who experienced greater discrimination and language hassles showed a lower sense of belonging with classmates and subsequently, greater psychological distress. Those who experienced greater language hassles also exhibited a lower sense of perceived competence, and ultimately poorer academic adjustment. We conclude that self-determination theory (SDT) provides an important framework to explain key processes underlying the links between acculturation hassles with psychological distress and academic (mal-)adjustment. Strengthening belonging and competence among adolescents of immigrant descent may enhance their well-being in the face of acculturation hassles.

Cultural diversity, migration and education.

Migration is not a new phenomenon. However, recent data indicate that unprecedented numbers of people have experienced forced migration around the world with 51% under the age of 18 years. How can educational policies and practices respond sensitively to increasing cultural and migration-based diversity? The purpose of this special section that includes eight studies is to consider these issues more deeply. As a frame for the special section, we address the main question: What are promotive or protective factors for positive development of children and youth attending culturally diverse school contexts? In the collection of papers, these promotive and protective factors range from peers and families, to teachers, to organisational context and climate. With continued disruptions in children's lives due to a pandemic, climate change, war, conflict and poverty, migration will remain a pressing concern and will continue to transform the student populations in our classrooms and schools for the foreseeable future. The need to address how we can best provide students from diverse backgrounds equitable and supportive education, continues.

The Identity Project intervention in Germany: Creating a climate for reflection, connection, and adolescent identity development.

We examined whether German adolescents who participated in an adapted 8-week school-based intervention, the Identity Project, reported greater changes in heritage and global identities and perceptions of classroom cultural climate. We used a longitudinal, wait-list control design pooling eight classrooms across the school years of 2018-2019 and 2019-2020. The sample included 195 seventh graders (Mage = 12.35 years, SD = .79, 39% female, 83% of migration background). Findings showed moderate support for more heritage identity exploration and greater perceptions of unequal treatment and critical consciousness climate in the intervention group. There were also important differences across conditions regarding how identity and climate related to adolescent outcomes. We conclude that the Identity Project can be adapted and applied in other cultural contexts such as Germany. It provides a necessary space for adolescents to engage in discussions about diversity, cultural heritage, social inequities, and their relevance to one's identities.

Culture's Influence on Stressors, Parental Socialization, and Developmental Processes in the Mental Health of Children of Immigrants.

Children of immigrants represent one in four children in the United States and will represent one in three children by 2050. Children of Asian and Latino immigrants together represent the majority of children of immigrants in the United States. Children of immigrants may be immigrants themselves, or they may have been born in the United States to foreign-born parents; their status may be legal or undocumented. We review transcultural and culture-specific factors that influence the various ways in which stressors are experienced; we also discuss the ways in which parental socialization and developmental processes function as risk factors or protective factors in their influence on the mental health of children of immigrants. Children of immigrants with elevated risk for mental health problems are more likely to be undocumented immigrants, refugees, or unaccompanied minors. We describe interventions and policies that show promise for reducing mental health problems among children of immigrants in the United States.

Time-varying associations of racial discrimination and adjustment among Chinese-heritage adolescents in the United States and Canada.

The aim of our study was twofold: to examine (a) whether the link between racial discrimination and adjustment showed age-related changes across early to late adolescence for Chinese-heritage youth and (b) whether the age-related associations of the discrimination-adjustment link differed by gender, nativity, and geographical region. We pooled two independently collected longitudinal data sets in the United States and Canada (N = 498, ages 12-19 at Wave 1) and used time-varying effect modeling to show that discrimination is consistently associated with poorer adjustment across all ages. These associations were stronger at certain ages, but for males and females, first- and second-generation adolescents, and US and Canadian adolescents they differed. There were stronger relations between discrimination and adjustment in early adolescence for males compared to females, in middle adolescence for first-generation compared to second-generation adolescents, and in early adolescence for US adolescents compared to Canadian adolescents. In general, negative implications for adjustment associated with discrimination diminished across the span of adolescence for females, second-generation, and US and Canadian adolescents, but not for males or first-generation adolescents. The results show that the discrimination-adjustment link must be considered with regard to age, gender, nativity, and region, and that attention to discrimination in early adolescence may be especially important.

Toward a New Understanding of Ethnic-Racial Settings for Ethnic-Racial Identity Development.

The purpose of this conceptual article is to advance theory and research on one critical aspect of the context of ethnic-racial identity (ERI) development: ethnic-racial settings, or the objective and subjective nature of group representation within an individual's context. We present a new conceptual framework that consists of four dimensions: (1) perspective (that settings can be understood in both objective and subjective terms); (2) differentiation (how groups are defined in a setting); (3) heterogeneity (the range of groups in a setting); and (4) proximity (the distance between the individual and the setting). Clarifying this complexity is crucial for advancing a more coherent understanding of how ethnic-racial settings are related to ERI development.

Person-centered trajectories of cultural values and behaviors among Chinese American adolescents.

This study examined change in acculturation values and behavior among 310 Chinese American adolescents, and how patterns of change were related to key demographic variables and indicators of positive youth development. Dual process group-based trajectory models of change in U.S. and Chinese values and behaviors indicated a six-group solution for each. The results showed that acculturation value patterns were not related to gender, nativity, or parent education, but were related to family cohesion, self-esteem, general and academic self-efficacy, and GPA. Acculturation behavior patterns were not related to gender but were related to nativity and parent education, and were also related to general self-efficacy and family cohesion. Taken together, our findings suggest that most trajectories of acculturation are associated with positive outcomes, but there are small groups of adolescents that function very well (those who maintain higher behavioral involvement in both) and some not very well, especially those whose behaviors are becoming more disparate over time. Special Issue: Explaining Positive Adaptation of Immigrant Youth across Cultures.

Equal but different: Effects of equality/inclusion and cultural pluralism on intergroup outcomes in multiethnic classrooms.

OBJECTIVES: Integrating research on intergroup contact and intercultural relations, we investigated effects of 2 types of cultural diversity norms (equality/inclusion and cultural pluralism) on outgroup orientation and perceived discrimination among students of immigrant and nonimmigrant background. METHOD: Our sample comprised 1,975 6th graders (Mage = 11.53, SDage = 0.69, 47% female) in Germany, of whom 1,213 (61%) were of immigrant background, defined as having at least 1 parent born in a different country. A total of 83 countries of origin were represented. We applied a multilevel framework to assess the impact of individual-level and class-level predictors on intergroup outcomes, controlling for the classroom ethnic composition, school track, and individual-level covariates. Immigrant background was treated as a moderator. RESULTS: The 2 types of cultural diversity norms were generally associated with more positive intergroup outcomes. Some of the associations differed in strength between students of immigrant and nonimmigrant background. There were stronger associations of equality/inclusion with higher outgroup orientation among students of nonimmigrant background and with lower perceived discrimination among students of immigrant background. Ethnic composition, as well as the classroom-aggregated diversity norms (diversity climate) showed weaker relations with the outcome variables. CONCLUSIONS: Equality/inclusion norms and cultural pluralism norms can make complementary contributions to positive relations between students of immigrant and nonimmigrant background. Equality/inclusion norms foster positive contact and equal treatment, while cultural pluralism norms emphasize that it is also important to value diversity.¹ (PsycINFO Database Record

Cognitive reappraisal and expressive suppression: Links to racial-ethnic discrimination and adjustment among Latino/a and Asian-heritage college students.

OBJECTIVE: We examined whether two key emotion regulation strategies, cognitive reappraisal and expressive suppression, moderated the relations between discrimination (i.e., foreigner objectification and general denigration) and adjustment. METHODS: Participants were U.S. Latino/a and Asian-heritage college students (N = 1,279, 67% female, 72% U.S. born) from the Multi-Site University Study of Identity and Culture (MUSIC). Students completed online self-report surveys in 2009. RESULTS: Multi-group path analysis demonstrated that a fully constrained model fit well for both Latino/a and Asian-heritage student data. The results showed that with increasing levels of denigration (but not foreigner objectification), the combination of lower cognitive reappraisal and higher expressive suppression was related to greater depressive symptoms, anxiety, and aggression. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings highlight the importance of examining multiple emotion regulation strategies simultaneously-considering what strategies are available to individuals and in what combination they are used-to understand how best to deal with negative emotions resulting from experiencing discrimination.

Development of an Asian American parental racial-ethnic socialization scale.

OBJECTIVE: To develop a measure of parental racial-ethnic socialization that is appropriate for Asian American families. METHOD: To test the reliability and validity of this new measure, we surveyed 575 Asian American emerging adults (49% female, 79% U.S. born). RESULTS: Using exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses, the results show 7 reliable subscales: maintenance of heritage culture, becoming American, awareness of discrimination, avoidance of other groups, minimization of race, promotion of equality, and cultural pluralism. Tests of factorial invariance show that overall, the subscales demonstrate, at minimum, partial metric invariance across gender, age, nativity, educational attainment, parent educational attainment, geographic region of residence, and Asian-heritage region. Thus, the relations among the subscales with other variables can be compared across these different subgroups. The subscales also correlated with ethnic identity, ethnic centrality, perceptions of discrimination, and pluralistic orientation, demonstrating construct validity. CONCLUSION: In an increasingly complex and diverse social world, our scale will be useful for gaining a better understanding of how Asian American parents socialize their children regarding issues of race, discrimination, culture, and diversity. (PsycINFO Database Record

Do dimensions of ethnic identity mediate the association between perceived ethnic group discrimination and depressive symptoms?

Ethnic group discrimination represents a notable risk factor that may contribute to mental health problems among ethnic minority college students. However, cultural resources (e.g., ethnic identity) may promote psychological adjustment in the context of group-based discriminatory experiences. In the current study, we examined the associations between perceptions of ethnic group discrimination and depressive symptoms, and explored dimensions of ethnic identity (i.e., exploration, resolution, and affirmation) as mediators of this process among 2,315 ethnic minority college students (age 18 to 30 years; 37% Black, 63% Latino). Results indicated that perceived ethnic group discrimination was associated positively with depressive symptoms among students from both ethnic groups. The relationship between perceived ethnic group discrimination and depressive symptoms was mediated by ethnic identity affirmation for Latino students, but not for Black students. Ethnic identity resolution was negatively and indirectly associated with depressive symptoms through ethnic identity affirmation for both Black and Latino students. Implications for promoting ethnic minority college students' mental health and directions for future research are discussed.

Obstacles to parent-adolescent communication in Hmong American families: exploring pathways to adolescent mental health promotion.

OBJECTIVE: Mental health challenges disproportionately affect children in refugee families, with Hmong American adolescents being an extreme case (Thao, Leite, and Atella 2010). Limited understanding about the processes associated with this enhanced risk for children of refugees exists. Obstacles to parent-adolescent communication may contribute to this increased risk (Laursen and Collins 2004). This study's objective is to explore our limited understanding of parent-adolescent communication in refugee families by examining communication obstacles among Hmong Americans. DESIGN: Thirty Hmong American young adults (18 to 25 years; mean = 21.2, 50% female or n =15) participated in interviews that focused retrospectively on the parent-adolescent relationship. RESULTS: Results revealed obstacles that were initiated by the adolescent, parent, and community. Two adolescent-focused sub-themes (emotional discomfort and psychosocial immaturity), five parent-focused sub-themes (parental judgment, parental intimidation, no benefits of communication with parents, generational/cultural differences, and lack of parent-adolescent bond), and two culture/community-focused sub-themes (traditions/values and vocabulary) emerged. CONCLUSIONS: The findings provide a foundation for future qualitative and quantitative studies to promote Hmong American family communication, and encourage an ecological approach to promote parent-adolescent communication conducive to supporting adolescent mental health outcomes.