Perceived group discrimination and psychological well-being in ethnic minority adolescents

Abstract

Few studies have examined the relation of perceived group discrimination and psychological well-being. Yet, there are theoretical reasons to expect such a relation, and members of ethnic minorities usually perceive higher levels of group discrimination than personal discrimination. In this research, we investigated the associations between perceived group discrimination and several indicators of psychological well-being among 354 Moroccan-Dutch adolescents controlling for perceived personal discrimination and testing the extent to which ethnic group identification moderated these associations. Our results showed that higher perceived group discrimination was associated with higher parent- and adolescent-reported internalizing (e.g., fear, worries) and externalizing problems (e.g., anger, aggression) but not with lower personal self-esteem. For personal self-esteem a negative association with perceived personal discrimination was found. Moreover, for adolescents with a strong ethnic group identification, there was no relationship between perceived group discrimination and parent- and adolescent-reported internalizing problems, while for those with a weak ethnic group identification, perceived group discrimination was associated with more parent- and adolescent-reported internalizing problems. Conversely, perceived group discrimination was unrelated to personal self-esteem among low identifiers, but positively related to it among high identifiers. Results indicate that minority group members can be negatively affected by discrimination, even if they do not experience it at first hand. Thus, future research on the psychological effects of discrimination should include group perceptions.