Attachment, Coping, Acculturative Stress, and Quality of Life among Haitian Immigrants

According to the U.S. Census, in 2002, the foreign-bom population (legal permanent residents, temporary and humanitarian migrants, and persons illegally present) was 32.5 million, representing 11.5% of the total U.S. population (Larsen, 2004). In 2001, 6% of all Blacks in the United States were foreign bom (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2001). Among the countries with the largest increase in immigration rates during the 1990s was Haiti (Terrazas, 2010). Results from Census 2000 show that there were 420,000 documented permanent U.S. residents from Haiti, making these immigrants the second largest group among the Black foreign-born population (Nicolas, DeSilva, Grey, & Gonzalez-Eastep, 2006). This figure may be larger given that undocumented populations often do not participate in the census (D. R. Williams & Jackson, 2000). Eighty percent of Haiti's population lives in poverty (Desrosiers & St. Fleurose, 2002). High illiteracy rates (47.1% of the total population), economic deprivation, and chronic malnutrition are among the obstacles facing Haitians in their homeland. Today, first-generation Haitians (i.e., individuals born in Haiti) continue to encounter a number of unique challenges in the United States. As members of the foreign-born population and Black racial minority group, U.S. Haitian immigrants are frequently confronted with racism and discrimination (Clark, Anderson, Clark, & Williams, 1999). Also, as members of the U.S. foreign-born population, Haitian immigrants are at risk for poverty. In 2002, 16.6% of the overall foreign-born population in the United States lived below the poverty level compared with 11.5% of the nonimmigrant population (Larsen, 2004). Among U.S. foreign-born households, 33.1% of Caribbean-born households had an income less than $20,000. In 2003, U.S. foreign-born individuals were more likely to be unemployed than were those born in the United States (Larsen, 2004). Given the number of Haitian immigrants in the United States, the conditions in their homeland from which they have fled, and the risk factors associated with their foreign-born Black minority status and group social standing, empirical research on the psychological well-being of Haitian immigrants is needed. The purpose of the present study was to examine the relationship between attachment and coping as predictors of acculturative stress and quality of life (QOL) in a sample of this population. * Model of Stress and Coping The study of acculturative stress has its roots in the broader stress, coping, and adaptation paradigms of Lazarus and Folkman (Berry, 2003; Folkman & Moskowitz, 2004). Lazarus and Folkman (1984) argued that the coping process occurs when a situation is appraised as personally significant or exceeding one's resources. They identified two major coping functions: (a) problem-focused (attempting to change or solve the problem) and (b) emotion-focused (attempting to regulate the emotions associated with the problem). The extensive literature on coping suggests that the coping appraisal process is linked to psychological adjustment (Robbins & Kliewer, 2000). Despite advancements in the coping literature and empirical support for Lazarus and Folkman's model, the coping literature has been largely based on non-Hispanic White participants of middle or upper-middle socioeconomic status (Culver, Arena, Wimberly, Antoni, & Carver, 2004). Although the impact of cultural conceptualizations on the appraisal process and coping responses is gaining recognition (Slavin, Rainer, McCreary, & Gowda, 1991), and despite calls for research in the area of stress and coping among minority and immigrant populations in the United States (Aldwin, 1994), very little is known about the ways in which these populations cope with stress. Aldwin (1994) proposed that culture influences coping in four ways: It shapes (a) the type of stress experienced; (b) the appraisal of the stressful event; (c) the choice of coping strategies; and (d) the mechanisms by which individuals cope, which in turn are influenced by the appraisal process, coping resources (and those provided by the culture), and the reactions of others. …