racial discrimination and stress response

Conditions: Stress Reaction; Acute

Summary: the goal of this study is to learn about whether ethnic minority adolescents' racial discrimination experience is related to dysregulated biological responses to subtle racism, and how the relationship may be attenuated or exacerbated by a set of social and cognitive factors. the main questions it aims to answer are: * to reveal the relationship between racial discrimination experiences and ethnic minority adolescents' stress response to subtle racism * to test parental ethnic-racial socialization, children's attribution to subtle racism and their racial identity as potential risk and protective factors.

racial discrimination experiences constitute significant risks for ethnic minority youth's physical and mental health problems. one explanation poses that chronic stress can lead to altered, dysregulated stress responses, which can make individuals susceptible to health problems. currently, there is no experimental study that comprehensively measure ethnic minority youth's stress response to subtle racism, or investigate the contributing roles of racial discrimination experience and possible risk and protective factors. a community sample of 9-14-year-old ethnic minority adolescents (40 latino american, 40 black/african american) and their parents will be recruited. the study employs an adapted peer rejection task which has been widely used with youth, and carefully designed to elicit the experience of subtle racial discrimination from white peers. adolescents' cardiovascular activity and saliva samples will be taken at multiple time points before, during, and after the peer rejection task, tapping on response involving hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (hpa) axis, autonomic nervous system (ans), and inflammatory mediator (im). adolescents will report their racial discrimination experience, make attribution about the peer rejection experience, report emotional experience, and rate their racial identity. adolescents will complete an impossible puzzle task to elicit cognitive stress, during which they will be asked to fit all puzzle pieces into a wooden frame with a wrong piece provided. their cardiovascular activity, attribution, and emotional experience in response to the impossible puzzle task will be measured. parents will complete a questionnaire to report their ethnic-racial socialization practices. the goals of this proposal are: 1) reveal the relationship between racial discrimination experiences and ethnic minority adolescents' stress response to subtle racism as well as to cognitive stress; and 2) test parental ethnic-racial socialization, children's attribution to subtle racism and their racial identity as potential risk and protective factors.

Eligibility criteria:
inclusion criteria: * 9-14 years old * identified as latino american or black/african american * living in warren county of kentucky * parents of eligible adolescents exclusion criteria: adolescents will not participate in the peer rejection task when they report to have: * frequent experiences of peer victimization * frequent experiences of racial discrimination * severe depression * severe social anxiety disorder * severe generalized anxiety disorder

Keywords: cardiovascular reactivity hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis inflammatory mediator subtle racism