Experiencing, appraising and coping with race -related stress: Black women living in New York City.
Item
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Title
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Experiencing, appraising and coping with race -related stress: Black women living in New York City.
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Identifier
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AAI3169928
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identifier
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3169928
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Creator
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Jones, Hollie L.
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Contributor
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Adviser: William Cross
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Date
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2005
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Language
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English
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Publisher
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City University of New York.
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Subject
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Psychology, Personality | Psychology, Social | Black Studies | Women's Studies
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Abstract
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The study represents an exploration of the relationship between race-related stress, Black identity, mental health and coping. Three hundred ten Black women attending three urban colleges completed a self-report survey instrument measuring race-related stress, Black identity attitudes, mental health, and coping. No connection was found between frequency of racist events and self-esteem, but a significant positive relationship between frequency of racist events and depression was recorded. There was also a significant, positive association between appraisal of racist events (ARE) and depression and a small, but significant association between ARE and self-esteem. This suggests that mentally healthy Black people can be made vulnerable to depression in the face of frequent encounters with racism and that appraisals may help distinguish those whose self-esteem is more vulnerable to race-related stress. Participants holding Racial-Self-Hatred, Anti-White and Afrocentric identity attitudes reported higher frequency of racist events in their lives, while those holding Assimilation attitudes reported a lower frequency of racist events. Appraising racist events as stressful was significantly and positively associated with Racial-Self-Hatred, Afrocentric, and Anti-White identity attitudes, and negatively associated with Assimilation attitudes. Regression analyses showed that Racial-Self-Hatred and Assimilation moderated the relationship between race-related stress and self-esteem, while Multiculturalism moderated the relationship between race-related stress and depression. In terms of coping, women used significantly more strategies when coping with a general, as compared to a race-related stressor. Similarly, women who reported a high level of negative emotion during a stressful event used significantly more coping strategies than women who reported low-negative emotion across all categories of coping. The primary conclusion to be drawn from the above findings is that experiencing a significant number of racist events can put Blacks at greater risk for depression but not low self-esteem, but experiencing racist events, which in turn are appraised as stressful, can make one even more vulnerable to depression and lower self-esteem. Furthermore, Black identity attitudes moderate the relationship between race-related stress and mental health, but only under certain conditions. Implications for mental health practitioners and future mental research are discussed.
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Type
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dissertation
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Source
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PQT Legacy CUNY.xlsx
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degree
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Ph.D.
