Examining racial identity statuses as predictors of psychological defenses in African American college students.

Abstract

The authors examined the relationship between racial identity statuses and the use of psychological defenses in 80 African American college students who completed the Black Racial Identity Attitude Scale (J. E. Helms & T. A. Parham, 1996), Defense Mechanism Inventory (G. C. Gleser & D. Ihilevich, 1969), and the Defense Style Questionnaire-40 (G. Andrews, M. Singh, & M. Bond, 1993). The canonical analysis indicated that pre-encounter and encounter ego statuses were positively related to neurotic psychological defenses as well as defenses of principalization and reversal. The immersion ego status was positively related to immature psychological defenses as well as turning against object and projection. The emersion ego status was positively related to mature psychological defenses as well as turning against object and projection. The authors believe these results provide additional support for J. E. Helms's (1995) racial identity model, because racial identity ego statuses predicted how African Americans managed painful affect. The discussion also focuses on implications of these results for counseling and future research.