Perceived Race-Based Discrimination and Health-Related Outcomes Among First-Year Undergraduate Students

Introduction:  It is well known that health disparities exist between racial and ethnic groups.  Research suggests that, beyond factors such as SES and access to health care, race-based discrimination, both actual and perceived, may significantly impact health behaviors and health outcomes.  Therefore, the purpose of this study was to examine relationships between racial discrimination and adverse health behaviors and outcomes amongst first-year college undergraduates and determine whether these relationships are moderated by perceived support.

Methods:  Participants were 844 first-year undergraduate students (m age = 18.98; 50% White; 57% Female).  Students self-reported experience with racial discrimination (yes (1) or no (0)) in 8 situations (e.g. at school, work, social settings).  Responses were summed and a 3-level categorical variable was created: no discrimination (0), low discrimination (1 or 2), and high discrimination (3 or more).  Students reported past year and past month alcohol and cigarette use, rated their overall health (very poor to very good) and rated five items assessing frequency of sleep problems over the past week.  Responses were summed, creating a sleep problems index.  Students also rated perceived stress over the past 30 days (not at all to very).  Finally, students rated perceived supportiveness of relationships with family, friends, faculty, and university staff (very unsupportive to very supportive), and responses to these 4 items were summed, creating a perceived support index.  Linear regression analyses were run controlling for age, gender, and race, and perceived support run as a moderator.

Results: 72.8% of students reported no experience of race-based discrimination, 9.6% reported 1 or 2, and 17.5% reported 3 or more.  Perceived race-based discrimination was significantly, positively associated with cigarette use during the past year (p=.01) and past 30 days (p=.004), as well as stress (p=.01) and sleep problems (p=.001).  Perceived race-based discrimination was not significantly associated with past year or past 30 day alcohol use, or perceived overall health.  While perceived support did not moderate any of these relationships (p>.05), it was significantly, negatively associated with race-based discrimination (p=.003).

Conclusions:  Findings indicate perceived race-based discrimination is associated with greater stress, cigarette consumption, and sleep problems among first-year undergraduate students.  While perceived support did not moderate the relationships between discrimination and health outcomes, further analysis indicated that discrimination was significantly, negatively associated with perceived support indicating a need for future research to determine whether lack of support mediates the relationship between race-based discrimination and health outcomes.