“Race was something we didn't talk about”: Racial Socialization in Asian American Families

• Published date: 01 October 2021
• Author: Jennifer L. Young,HaeDong Kim,Laura Golojuch
• Date: 01 October 2021
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/fare.12495

J L. Y Stanford University

HD K Towson University

L G University of Maryland

“Race was something we didn’t talk about”: Racial

Socialization in Asian American Families

Objective: Our goal was to explore racial

socialization practices in Asian American

families during a time of heightened racial

tension.

Background: Asian Americans hold a complex

racial position in the United States, made even

more complicated by an increase in public

protests regarding socioracial injustices in the

United States experienced by racial minority

groups. Discussions about race and ethnicity

occur within Asian American families but often

focus on cultural heritage rather than aware-

ness of discrimination and the historical roots

of racism.

Method: Our study used an inductive–deductive

thematic analysis to collect data from 12 Asian

American young adults. Semistructured inter-

views queried participants’ experiences with

racial socialization in their nuclear families and

their own racial identity.

Findings: Qualitative analysis revealed the

following themes: (a) Participants received

limited messages regarding racial issues, (b)

participants engaged in “bottom-up” racial

socialization and taught their parents about

Center for Biomedical Ethics, Stanford School of Medicine,

1215 Welch Road, Modular A, Rm 78, Stanford, CA 94305

(youngjl@stanford.edu).

KeyWords: Asian American families, intergenerationalcom-

munication, qualitative research,racial socialization, young

adults.

race, and (c) participants felt left out of society’s

racial dialogue.

Conclusion: During this time of heightened

racial tension, Asian American young adults

struggle to nd their place, despite wanting to

participate in community building.

Implications: Without strong Asian American

racial socialization practices in families, young

adults must educate themselves and initiate

racial meaning-making in their families.

The Asian American population is the fastest

growing racial group in the United States (Pew

Research Center, 2017), yet Asian American

families are often overlooked in research, clini-

cal outreach, and advocacy efforts. Despite the

fact that the Asian population has increased

by 72% since 2000, clinical research efforts

focused on Asian American, Native Hawaiian,

and Pacic Islander populations have made up

only 0.17% of the National Institutes of Health

budget since 1992 (Doàn et al., 2019). This pop-

ulation also experiences great heterogeneity in

dening what it means to be Asian in America. A

person’s sense of identity is inuenced by social-

ization processes on multiple systemic levels,

from our political systems, to our communities,

to our nuclear friend and family groups (Burke

& Stets, 2009). The socialization of Asian Amer-

icans regarding their race, ethnicity, and culture

is central to individual and family development,

as well as their sense of racial identity (Kiang

Family Relations 70 (October 2021): 1027–1039 1027

DOI:10.1111/fare.12495