Timing and Predictors of Experienced Racial Discrimination Among African American Adolescents

Introduction: Prior studies indicate that racial discrimination contributes to the persistence of race-based disparities in income, education, incarceration, and an array of mental and physical health outcomes affecting African Americans. Recent research with African American children and adolescents suggests that racial discrimination becomes salient and etiologically-meaningful early in their lives. However, a paucity of longitudinal studies has investigated the timing of exposure to racial discrimination among African American youth. In addition, no research to date has examined contextual factors associated with youths’ first experience of racial discrimination. These omissions in the literature narrow our understanding of the developmental timing of racial discrimination in the lives of African American youth and limit our ability to design effective preventive interventions to combat the insidious effects of the stressor. Thus, this study investigated the timing and predictors of African American adolescents’ initial racial discrimination exposure. It was hypothesized that contextual factors would be associated with the time to initial exposure to racial discrimination during middle and high school.

Methods: Participants were a community sample of 452 urban African American adolescents. In each of grades 7 through 12 and yearly for 6 years afterward, participants reported about their experiences with racial discrimination. Information was also obtained on participants’ SES, neighborhood environment, and justice system involvement. Survival analyses were used to examine the timing of initial racial discrimination experience and whether contextual factors were associated with the hazard of racial discrimination exposure.

Results: By the spring of grade 7, 61.5% of participants reported experiencing racial discrimination. Less than 1% of respondents “survived” until the end of high school without experiencing racial discrimination. SES, neighborhood disorder and justice system contact predicted the timing of initial exposure to racial discrimination.

Conclusions: This study provides valuable information on the timing of racial discrimination experiences for African American adolescents. Results indicate that experienced racial discrimination affects the lives of the majority of African American adolescents as early as 7^th grade and affects virtually all adolescents before the end of high school, with SES, neighborhood disorder and justice system contact predicting earlier experiences of racial discrimination. These findings suggest that preventive interventions targeting the negative effects associated with racial discrimination should start prior to 7^th grade for African American adolescents and consider environmental factors affecting these youth.