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School context influences the ethnic identity development of immigrant children in middle childhood
Author(s) -
Brown Christia Spears
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
social development
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.078
H-Index - 91
eISSN - 1467-9507
pISSN - 0961-205X
DOI - 10.1111/sode.12240
Subject(s) - ethnic group , operationalization , psychology , context (archaeology) , multiculturalism , immigration , developmental psychology , identity (music) , interpersonal communication , social psychology , sociology , pedagogy , political science , philosophy , physics , epistemology , anthropology , acoustics , law , paleontology , biology
The present paper describes a study investigating the ethnic identity development of Latino immigrant children ( n = 155) in middle childhood (ages 8–11) in a predominantly White community. The study examined how ethnic identity was related to children's school context. School context was operationalized at the structural level, as the ethnic composition of the teachers and peers, as well as the schools' implicit messages about their valuing of multiculturalism; and the proximal interpersonal level, as children's perceptions of peer discrimination and teacher fairness. Results indicated that both the structural and proximal context predicted children's ethnic label choices, the importance placed on their ethnic identity, the positivity of their ethnic identity, and their American identity.