Troubled waters: Barriers to preparation for bias conversations across racially/ethnically diverse families

• Published date: 01 December 2022
• Author: Laura M. Gonzalez,Michelle Y. Martin Romero,Gabriela Livas Stein,Stephanie Irby Coard,Lisa Kiang
• Date: 01 December 2022
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/fare.12769

RESEARCH

Troubled waters: Barriers to preparation for bias

conversations across racially/ethnically diverse

families

Laura M. Gonzalez

1

|Michelle Y. Martin Romero

2

|

Gabriela Livas Stein

3

|Stephanie Irby Coard

4

|Lisa Kiang

5

1

Department of Teacher Education/Higher

Education, University of North Carolina at

Greensboro

2

Department of Public Health Education,

University of North Carolina at Greensboro

3

Department of Psychology, University of

North Carolina at Greensboro

4

Department of Human Development and

Family Studies, University of North Carolina

at Greensboro

5

Department of Psychology, Wake Forest

University, North Carolina

Correspondence Gabriela Livas Stein,

Department of Psychology, University of

North Carolina at Greensboro, P.O. Box

26170, 1300 Spring Garden Street,

Greensboro, NC 27402, USA.

Email: glstein@uncg.edu

Funding information

The preparation of this manuscript was

partially supported by a postdoctoral

fellowship provided by the National Institute

of Child Health and Human Development

(T32-HD07376) through the Center for

Developmental Science/Frank Porter Graham

Child Development Institute, University of

North Carolina at Chapel Hill, to M. Martin

Romero.

Abstract

Background: Parent–child racial-ethnic socialization con-

versations are an important tool to cultivate a sense of

pride and equip youth to deal with discrimination. How-

ever, conversations about preparation for racial bias can

be particularly difficult for parents to deliver effectively.

Little research has been done that illuminates the types of

challenges parents within and across racial-ethnic groups

experience with this task. The current qualitative study

addresses this gap.

Design: The study draws on focus group data collected

from parents and children from African American,

Chinese American, Mexican American, and Indian Ameri-

can (South Asian) families (N=138 individuals; 30 focus

groups). Coding was done by a racially and ethnically

diverse research team using inductive thematic analysis

(Braun & Clarke, 2006).

Results: Youth and parents reflected on barriers to having

effective preparation for bias conversations, including

(a) parents’uncertainty in approaching the conversations;

(b) tensions in identifying, understanding, and decoding

racial discrimination; and (c) generational differences

between parents and youth.

Conclusion: Themes are unpacked from a social learning

perspective, approaching the barriers from a person-based,

context-based, and behavior-based point of view. Unique

and similar experiences across the racial-ethnic groups

were noted, including perspectives from U.S.-born and

immigrant parents.

Received: 26 March 2021Revised: 9 March 2022Accepted: 27 May 2022

DOI: 10.1111/fare.12769

This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs License, which permits

use and distribution in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, the use is non-commercial and no modifications or

adaptations are made.

© 2022 The Authors. Family Relations published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of National Council on Family Relations.

1878 Family Relations. 2022;71:1878–1895.

wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/fare

Implications: The authors share implications for racial-

ethnic socialization intervention strategies with parents are

shared.

KEYWORDS

African American families, Asian and Latinx immigrant families,

preparation for bias, qualitative, racial-ethnic discrimination

In the recent social landscape of the United States, incidents of race-related bias, discrimination,

and harassment against minoritized racial-ethnic groups have increased (Umaña-Taylor &

Hill, 2020), compelling individuals and families to respond. Scholarly literature suggests that

youth from minoritized families benefit from targeted racial-ethnic socialization (RES) conver-

sations with their parents or guardians to help them construct a positive racial-ethnic identity

and understand and respond to experiences of racial-ethnic discrimination (Ay

on et al., 2020;

Coard et al., 2004; Hughes et al., 2006; Neblett et al., 2006). Through RES conversations, par-

ents can shape the social environment of their families by communicating messages of racial

identity, cultural pride, values, boundaries, and basic rights to their children and to others with

whom they interact. Hughes et al. (2006) provided a key foundation in this literature by identi-

fying four content areas that are often conveyed in RES conversations (i.e., cultural socializa-

tion, promotion of mistrust, egalitarianism, and preparation for bias).

Both cultural socialization (i.e., knowledge and pride in one’s ethnic heritage) and prepara-

tion for bias messages are important for youth to receive; however, preparation for bias mes-

sages are often more difficult for parents to deliver (Stein et al., 2021). Compared with cultural

socialization, fewer families tend to report engaging in intentional preparation for bias conver-

sations (Priest et al., 2014). However, these conversations are crucial in buffering the negative

effects of discrimination by providing youth with specific skills to navigate those experiences

(Harris-Britt et al., 2007). Preparation for bias conversations include identifying racial-ethnic

discrimination, discussing the likelihood of such encounters, and teaching effective ways to

respond with dignity while keeping safety foremost in mind (Ay

on et al., 2019). Parents can

support youth by teaching them to respond to the specific situations of discrimination they are

likely to encounter (Hughes et al., 2016) but may be reluctant because these conversations are

difficult for parents to deliver (Anderson & Stevenson, 2019). Although past theoretical and

empirical work has explored RES strategies in families (e.g., Anderson & Stevenson, 2019;

Ay

on et al., 2019; Juang et al., 2018), this study aims to extend this literature by shedding light

on the shared and unique barriers to these challenging conversations across parents from four

racial-ethnic groups (African American, Chinese American, Indian/South Asian American, and

Mexican American).

RACIAL-ETHNIC SOCIALIZATION AND PARENTING ACROSS

GROUPS

Preparation for bias is a difficult topic and a challenging task for parents. Like many parenting

functions, this task is interactive, relying on the psychological resources of the parent, the traits

and responses of the child, and aspects of the context (Belsky, 1984). Steps in the task can

include forming an intention to prepare youth for discrimination, crafting a message about

expressions of racism in the United States, identifying situation-specific strategies for staying

safe and maintaining self-esteem, selecting a delivery method for the message that fits youth

and context, and then enacting the behavior (Harris-Britt et al., 2007). Possible barriers that

may hinder RES are embedded within each of these steps. For example, parents who have

BARRIERS TO PREPARATION FOR BIAS CONVERSATIONS1879