Biracial Youth Essay

397 Words2 Pages

With the rapidly rising of biracial youth, it has been proven that the population is a vulnerable group facing potentially higher risks for mental health and behavioral issues compared to their mono-racial counterparts. Identity development, a central psychosocial task of children, is a complex task for biracial youths since they must integrate two ethnic identities. For biracial youths, mastery of the psychosocial identity developmental task can be overwhelming as they face stressors such as racial stigmas and negative stereotypes, which may lead to identity problems manifesting during adolescence. Biracial teenagers are a growing population who have some unique characteristics, related to their ambiguous ethnicity and their need to define …show more content…

Comparisons were made to identify patterns and themes for factors affecting self-esteem and ethnic identity level among the participants. The results shown were culturally-based protective factors stemming from individual, family, and social domains promoting psychosocial resilience in fostering healthy biracial identity resolution. Risk factors unique for the biracial population were also identified. The outcomes indicate that biracial boys have a higher rate of depression and a higher frequency of school suspension, while the multiracial girls have a higher frequency for delinquent acts than their mono-racial peers. Compared to their White and African American minority counterparts, biracial youths reported “significantly more maladjustment than other youths in reports of behavioral conduct, school problems, somatization, and general self-worth"(Kawakami-Schwarber, 2010). Results have also shown that multiracial youths reported suffering a higher rate of negative affective behavior such as feeling depressed, having sleep problems, waking up tired and also psychosomatic symptoms including aches, pains and headaches. The findings underscore the importance in understanding how the environment shapes and influences the ways biracial youth negotiate their dual