Exploring the Vocational Rehabilitation Acceptance Rates for Hispanics Versus Non-Hispanics in the United States.

Much confusion surrounds the definition of racial status (Banks, 1997). In psychology, race is avoided because of the wide disagreement of what is meant by race (Zuckerman, 1990). In fact, since the term first appeared about 300 years ago, the term race has been misused and misunderstood (Atkinson, Morten, & Sue, 1993). Although there is an obvious overlap in the meaning of the terms race and ethnicity, the Rehabilitation Services Administration (RSA; 1995), which comes under the United States Department of Education and the United States Census, defines race and ethnicity as two separate terms (U.S. Census Bureau, 2001a) as do other authors such as the following. According to Sue et al. (1998), "the two dominant definitions of race are based on either a constellation of biological and physical traits or internal/external social perspective" (p. 8). When referring to racial minorities, some researchers prefer the phrase "people of color." People of color are "non-White ethnic minority groups, such as [Native Americans] and African Americans" (Banks, 1997, p. 66). Carter (1995) preferred to use the word race instead of ethnicity because the experiences that people of color have in the United States are superseded by race (color/hue; for further support of Carter's assertion see Bennett, 1995; Devine & Elliot, 1995; Freud, 1938; Hacker, 1995; Schulman et al., 1999). As did Carter, we believe that one's phenotype is a primary characteristic in determining the intensity of discrimination in the United States. In addition, we thought that it would be prudent to use the federal government's (U.S. Census and the Department of Education; U.S. Bureau of the Census, 1990) definition of race to maintain the apple-to-apple comparisons in many sections of the article. The term race will be all-inclusive to include all groups (e.g., African Americans, White Americans, Native Americans or Alaskan Natives, and Asian or Pacific Islanders). The phrase "ethnic or racial minorities" will include only African Americans, Native Americans or Alaskan Natives, and Asian or Pacific Islanders. "Hispanics constitute an ethnic group rather than a racial category, and their members may classify themselves as White, Black, or some other race" (Rawlings & Saluter, 1994, p. xii; also see U.S. Census Bureau, 2001a). Ethnicity deals with a shared culture, values, beliefs, loci of control, language, and the spiritually of a particular group of individuals (Banks, 1991; Dana, 1998). The term ethnicity is more comprehensive and includes both race and culture of origin (Phinney, 1996). "Although an ethnic minority group, like an ethnic group, shares a common culture [e.g., behaviors patterns, values, symbols], a historic tradition, and a sense of peoplehood, it also has unique physical and/or cultural characteristics that enable individuals who belong to other ethnic groups to identify its members easily, often for discrimination purposes" (Banks, 1991, p. 64; Hacker, 1995). When the term ethnicity is used, Hispanics will be included as a descriptor. * Overview of the Need to Research the U.S. Hispanic Population Evidence suggests that access to vocational rehabilitation (VR) is more difficult for racial minorities than for nonminorities/ White Americans (Wilson, 1999; Wilson, Harley, McCormick, Jolivette, & Jackson, 2001; Wilson, Jackson, & Doughty, 1999). The difficulties in accessing the VR system are underscored by changing U.S. demographics. Because the Hispanic ethnic group is not considered a race (RSA, 1995; U.S. Census Bureau, 2001a), Hispanics were largely excluded in many studies investigating VR access. Between 1980 and 1990 the White American population increased only 7.7%, while the African American population increased by 15.8% (Rogers, Conoley, Ponterotto, & Wiese, 1992). The 2000 U.S. Census (U.S. Census Bureau, 2001b) reported that the Hispanic population is becoming the largest ethnic minority group in the United States. …