The proposed research is designed to examine (1) the potential risks that different situations of racial/ethnic stigma has on adolescents psychological health (2) the contextual factors that exacerbates the potential negative impact of personal experiences of racial/ethnic discrimination on psychological health, and (3) the individual and environmental factors that attenuates the relation between personal experiences of discrimination and psychological health. A series of five studies will be conducted to look at the influence that racial/ethnic discrimination has on multiple facets of adolescents psychological health, which includes academic motivation, school performance, mental health, and problem behaviors. In the first study, the focus will be on investigating the specific dimensions of racial/ethnic identity that potentially serves as protective factors against the deleterious consequences of personal experiences of discrimination. The second study will look at the impact that experiences of personal discrimination and ethnic identity has on adolescents developmental trajectories of psychological health. The third study will assess whether school-level discrimination impacts psychological functioning; in addition, it will also look at whether characteristics of the school can exacerbate or alleviate the impact that racial/ethnic discrimination has on adolescents psychological health. The fourth study will examine the impact that discrimination at the neighborhood-level has on psychological health. The fifth study will address whether racial discrimination in multiple settings have an additive impact on the psychological health of adolescents. Multivariate and multilevel analytic techniques, such as hierarchical regression, Hierarchical Linear Modeling, and growth curve modeling, will be used to examine data from three large scale studies of adolescents of different racial/ethnic groups, including Whites.
