Maxine Seaborn Thompson

THE BLACKER THE BERRY Gender, Skin Tone, Self-Esteem, and Self-Efficacy

Using data from the National Survey of Black Americans, this study examines the way in which gender socially constructs the importance of skin tone for evaluations of self-worth and self-competence. Skin tone has negative effects on both self-esteem and self-efficacy but operates in different domains of the self for men and for women. Skin color is an important predictor of self-esteem for Black women but not Black men. And color predicts self-efficacy for Black men but not Black women. This pattern conforms to traditional gendered expectations of masculinity and femininity. Moreover, there are conditions of success that allow women to escape the effects of colorism. The impact of skin tone on self-esteem was much weaker for women from higher social class. Those who had lower self-esteem scores were dark-skinned women from working classes and dark-skinned women who were judged unattractive.

The Influence of Family Composition on Children’s Conformity to the Student Role

This article examines how parent configuration (two-parent, mother-extended, or solo-mother) and number of siblings affect first graders’ conformity to the student role as measured by their absences, latenesses, and conduct marks. The article builds on earlier studies by examining the different living arrangements of single parents and by directly comparing compliance indicators for African-American and White children when socioeconomic status, parents’ expectations, mother’s age, and kindergarten attendance are taken into account for both. African-American children with more sibs are more often absent or late. Both White and African-American children with sibs get better marks in conduct at the beginning of first grade. Also, both White and African-American children from two-parent families improve their conduct over first grade more than do their counterparts from solo-mother homes. However, only African Americans from mother-extended homes, not White children from mother-extended homes, improve in conduct over the year. Since two-parent homes generally contain more sibs, sib effects in prior research may have inflated positive effects on schooling attributed to two-parent family arrangements.

The association between aging inmate housing management models and non-geriatric health services in state correctional institutions.

Abstract One of the current debates in the literature on aging inmates asks, what is the most efficient housing/health care model for this “special needs” population? State and federal correctional systems place elderly inmates either in specialized segregated housing units away from the general inmate population, consolidate elderly inmates in housing units within the prison, or provide a combination of both models. In general, proponents of the segregated housing model argue that aging inmates will receive specialized medical services in geriatric units. However, proponents of consolidated housing model argue that aging inmates will have the benefit of both geriatric and non-geriatric health services. This paper examines the association between the type of housing management model for aging inmates and the availability of non-geriatric physical and mental health services. Data for the analysis come from the 2000 Bureau of Justice Statistics Census of State and Federal Adult Correctional Facilities. The results suggest that institutions offering consolidated geriatric care provide more mental health services and that these effects are independent of the characteristics of prison facility.

Problem Posing and Cultural Tailoring Developing an HIV/AIDS Health Literacy Toolkit With the African American Community

The rate of HIV infection among African Americans is disproportionately higher than for other racial groups in the United States. Previous research suggests that low level of health literacy (HL) is an underlying factor to explain racial disparities in the prevalence and incidence of HIV/AIDS. The present research describes a community and university project to develop a culturally tailored HIV/AIDS HL toolkit in the African American community. Paulo Freire’s pedagogical philosophy and problem-posing methodology served as the guiding framework throughout the development process. Developing the HIV/AIDS HL toolkit occurred in a two-stage process. In Stage 1, a nonprofit organization and research team established a collaborative partnership to develop a culturally tailored HIV/AIDS HL toolkit. In Stage 2, African American community members participated in focus groups conducted as Freirian cultural circles to further refine the HIV/AIDS HL toolkit. In both stages, problem posing engaged participants’ knowledge, experiences, and concerns to evaluate a working draft toolkit. The discussion and implications highlight how Freire’s pedagogical philosophy and methodology enhances the development of culturally tailored health information.

Race, Socioeconomic Status, and Self-Esteem: The Impact of Religiosity

This research examines two factors that have an impact on the self-esteem of African Americans and whites: religion and socioeconomic status (SES). Using data from the National Survey of Families and Households, we find that for whites, belief in the Bible (i.e., that it is the literal word of God) and self-identifying as fundamentalist were significant predictors of self-esteem. For African Americans, belief in the Bible and being Catholic were significant predictors of self-esteem. However, the association between belief in the Bible and self-esteem was stronger for African Americans than whites. SES was positively associated with self-esteem for both groups. The interactions between SES and the measures of religiosity reveal a greater impact on self-esteem for lower SES respondents. This was especially true for African Americans. These findings are discussed in light of the resource compensation hypothesis.

Race and General Strain Theory: Microaggressions As Mundane Extreme Environmental Stresses

This article spotlights racial microaggressions as relevant for understanding delinquency and the race gap in offending among middle-schoolers. In doing so, we draw on an emerging body of delinquency research rooted in general strain theory that demonstrates the emotional and behavioral tolls of face-to-face discrimination. We contend that this body of research has not established the full impact of racial microaggressions on delinquency because it has not considered that the specter of microaggressive encounters follows African American youth in particular from experience to experience. Specifically, we propose that racial microaggressions influence juvenile offending both directly—as previously documented—and by exacerbating the impact of co-occurring stressful events and experiences on negative emotions and delinquency. Using data collected at a southeastern middle-school, we find support for this proposition, empirically documenting that racial microaggressions interact with co-occurring stressful experiences in OLS models predicting delinquency.

Discrimination-related Anger, Religion, and Distress: Differences between African Americans and Caribbean Black Americans:

The Charleston Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church (AMEC) survivors’ forgiveness of the racially motivated shootings prompted our research of the association between religion, discrimination-related anger, and psychological distress among black Americans. Using the first representative national sample of Caribbean black Americans, the National Survey of American Life, we examine if discrimination-related anger produces more psychological distress for African Americans than Caribbean black Americans and if religious emotional support lowers distress from discrimination-related anger. Our findings show discrimination-related anger is associated with less distress for Caribbean black Americans than African Americans. Religious emotional support is associated with lower levels of distress and buffers the mental health of later generation Caribbean black Americans who report anger. African Americans reporting discrimination without anger show lower levels of psychological distress than their counterparts who experience anger. Thus, we have partial support that mercy towards one’s transgressor, illustrated by the Charleston Emanuel AMEC survivors, may benefit mental health.

Race, Skin Tone, and Educational Achievement

Research on skin-tone bias has focused primarily on intraracial inequality with little attention to skin-tone inequality across ethnoracial groups. We engage the debate over the color line by considering the independent, simultaneous, and interactive impacts of skin tone and self-identified race on educational performance. Analyses of National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health) and Adolescent Health and Academic Achievement (AHAA) data show significant skin-tone differences in grade point average (GPA) both across and within racial groups, with darker skinned tone individuals receiving significantly lower grades than their lighter skinned tone counterparts. Net of controls, skin-tone differences in GPA are essentially flat among African Americans but are notably stronger among other race/ethnic groups. These findings highlight the interplay between racial categorization and colorism by revealing the categorical disadvantage of racial stigma versus the more fluid colorism boundaries of nonblack groups.