Same-ethnic Friendships Research Articles

Constructed online experiences facilitate ethnic-racial identity development among Black and Latinx adolescents

Using latent profile analysis and a longitudinal design, we explored how Black and Latinx adolescents’ (N = 535; Mage = 14.47, SD = 1.99) construction of their race/ethnic and civic-related online experiences facilitated ethnic-racial identity (ERI) development over time. Profiles comprised five indicators: ethnic-racial identity exploration, making same-ethnic friends, same-ethnic group communication, other group orientation, and online civic engagement. We identified five profiles: Low Ingroup Connectors rarely made same-ethnic friends online. Moderate Connectors were average on all indicators. High Ingroup Connectors were high on seeking same-ethnic friends online. High Ingroup Engaged Connectors were highest on online ethnic-racial identity exploration, making same-ethnic friends, and civic engagement. Civically Engaged Connectors were high on online civic engagement and low on making same-ethnic friends online. Further, we found that High Ingroup Connectors had the most positive ERI outcomes one year later among Black and Latinx youth after controlling for earlier ERI and other covariates.

Belonging in diverse contexts: Sociability among same-ethnic and cross-ethnic peers.

Ethnically and racially diverse schools provide students opportunities to socially interact with both same- and cross-ethnic peers that can shape their sense of belonging within a school. This study investigates the extent to which same- or cross-ethnic friends influence feelings of school belonging in two large, diverse U.S. high schools (total N = 4,461; 9th-12th grade; 49.6% girls). Employing a longitudinal social network analytic approach, using stochastic actor-oriented modeling, this study found that students become more similar or stay similar to their same-ethnic friends, but not cross-ethnic friends, with no clear indication that students select friends based on similar levels of belonging. These novel findings highlight how feelings of school belonging are fostered through sociability in same-ethnic friend groups. Implications for interventions and other approaches to enhance school belonging are discussed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

Cross-ethnic and same-ethnic friendships in elementary classrooms: Unique associations with school adjustment

Using a multi-cohort, 5-month longitudinal design, this study examined prospective links between stable cross-ethnic (CEF) and same-ethnic friendships (SEF) and psychosocial and academic indicators of school adjustment in elementary classrooms in the Midwest and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The sample included 1960 1st (Mage = 6.9), 3rd (Mage = 9.0), and 5th (Mage = 10.9) grade students followed from the middle to the end of the school year. Results showed that 64% and 66% of all children had at least 1 stable CEF and SEF, respectively; the frequency of each friendship type was higher across ascending grades. Stable CEF uniquely predicted residualized change in 4 indicators of school adjustment (lower loneliness and peer victimization, greater sense of peer community and academic effort); stable SEF uniquely predicted 2 indicators of school adjustment (lower loneliness and peer victimization). Classroom ethnic diversity moderated the link between CEF and peer victimization.

When Ethnicity and Gender Align: Classroom Composition, Friendship Segregation, and Collective Identities in European Schools

AbstractUsing survey data on school classes in four European countries, we study how the social relations and identities of adolescents develop depending on the degree to which ethnic and gender boundaries align with each other. Minority students will have mostly same-ethnic friends, we find, when classmates of different ethnic origins tend to be of the opposite sex as well. Within such local topographies of boundaries, minority students will also end up identifying less as members of the nation. In contrast, majority students are not affected by the alignment of ethnic and gender boundaries, and gender identities of both minorities and majorities are less malleable as well: Neither friendship segregation along gender divides nor the development of gender role attitudes depend on the degree to which gender and ethnic origin align. We argue that gender boundaries and feelings of national belonging among majority students are widely taken for granted and thus less sensitive to attribute alignment at the local level. The article builds a bridge between the literatures on ethnic segregation of friendship networks, adolescent ethnic identities, and gender role attitudes by integrating them into a structuralist framework that identifies the conditions under which the local configuration of boundaries affects social life.

Psychological and social adjustment in refugee adolescents: The role of parents' and adolescents' friendships.

Friendships have important implications for adolescents' psychological and social adjustment. However, there is still limited evidence on how different same-ethnic and cross-ethnic friendships are formed and regarding their role in refugee adjustment. Therefore, the present study was designed to examine the interplay of parents' and adolescents' same-ethnic and cross-ethnic friendships with adolescents' own psychological and social adjustment among refugee adolescents. Participants were 208 Syrian refugees (71.2% female; Mage = 15.35, SDage = 0.95) in the Southeastern Anatolia Region of Turkey. Findings indicated that refugee parents' same-ethnic and cross-ethnic friendships were positively related to their children's same-ethnic and cross-ethnic friendships. Moreover, parents' same-ethnic friendships were negatively linked with adolescents' social well-being, whereas parents' cross-ethnic friendships were positively related to adolescents' social well-being. Furthermore, adolescents' same-ethnic and cross-ethnic friendships were both positively related to adolescents' social well-being, and cross-ethnic friendships were also positively associated with psychological well-being. These findings suggest that adolescents' cross-ethnic friendships mediated the positive associations of parents' cross-ethnic friendships with adolescents' social and psychological well-being. Overall, our study provides novel insights into the protective roles of diverse friendships for refugee adolescents.

Ethnicity, Peers, and Academic Achievement: Who Wants to be Friends with the Smart Kids?

Ethnic differences in peer reactions to academic achievement during adolescence has been a widely discussed but controversial issue in developmental and education research. Do peers respond positively or negatively to classmates of different ethnic groups who get good grades in school? The current study addressed this question by examining the linkage between academic achievement and friendship nominations received in an ethnically diverse sample of 4501 sixth grade students (Mage = 11.3 years; 51% female; 41.3% Latino, 25.1% White, 19.3% Asian, and 14.3% Black). The results of mediated moderation analyses showed that for Asians and Whites, higher academic achievement was associated with more same-ethnic friendships, whereas for Blacks and Latinos, higher academic achievement was associated with more cross-ethnic friendships. In addition, ethnic differences in the linkage between academic achievement and friendships were partly explained by classroom ethnic composition. Implications for promoting friendships of high achieving students both within and across ethnic boundaries were discussed.

“We need to stick together for survival”: Black college students’ racial identity, same-ethnic friendships, and campus connectedness.

“We need to stick together for survival”: Black college students’ racial identity, same-ethnic friendships, and campus connectedness.

A qualitative study of how exclusion processes shape friendship development among Turkish-Belgian university students

Our knowledge of how ethnic minority students explain and make sense of their friendship preferences in a university setting remains limited, despite the significance of friendships in the adaptation of students to higher education. Drawing on findings from qualitative interviews, this article explores the friendship preferences of 20 Turkish-Belgian university students in the northern part of Belgium. An inductive thematic analysis is conducted to analyse the interviews through constant comparison. The findings demonstrate that students who preferred same-ethnic friendships valued the role of familiarity and a shared understanding. Students with predominantly interethnic friends referred to having interests and attitudes similar to those of their friends. While students’ friendship preferences evolved over time throughout their educational career, the university context allowed students to strengthen or change their preferences for certain groups of friends with particular traits and/or lifestyles and hence facilitated their preferences for homophilous friendships. These friendship preferences and searches were also shaped by inclusion/exclusion processes. Nearly all participants felt excluded or othered by peers of Belgian origin during everyday interactions on campus. However, they interpreted these exclusion experiences differently based on their peer groups and used distinct coping mechanisms, resulting in distinct patterns of friendship preferences.

What Drives Ethnic Homophily? A Relational Approach on How Ethnic Identification Moderates Preferences for Same-Ethnic Friends

Individual preferences for same-ethnic friends contribute to persistent segregation of adolescents’ friendship networks. Yet, we know surprisingly little about the mechanisms behind ethnic homophily. Prior research suggests that ethnic homophily is ubiquitous, but a social identity perspective indicates that strong ingroup identification drives ingroup favoritism. Combining a social identity perspective with a relational approach, we ask whether the presumed increased homophily of high identifiers extends to all ingroup members, or whether it is conditional on the strength of same-ethnics’ identification. We propose that the strength of ethnic identification affects not only how much individuals desire same-ethnic friends, but also how attractive they are as potential friends to others. Fitting stochastic actor-oriented models to German adolescent school-based network panel data, we find that ethnic homophily is driven by an interplay of peers’ ethnic identification: high identifiers befriend same-ethnic peers who share their strong ethnic identification, while excluding same-ethnic low identifiers. Low identifiers, in turn, tend to avoid befriending inter-ethnic high identifiers. Our relational approach reveals that ethnic homophily is hardly ubiquitous but requires strong identification of both parties of a (potential) friendship.

Friendship Bias in Ethnic Categorization

AbstractInterethnic friendships are highly beneficial for decreasing ethnic prejudice. However, this is not true when friends identifying with different ethnic groups perceive each other as of the same ethnicity. We investigate the extent to which people categorize their friends “incorrectly”, that is, not matching these friends’ self-identifications. We thus move beyond the established practice of conceptualizing ethnic categorization as an individual characteristic (“who is categorized into which ethnicity”), and define it on the level of pairwise relations (who categorizes whom into which ethnicity), which enables us to model the effect of friendship on ethnic categorization. Using dynamic social network models, we also disentangle this effect from the simultaneous effect of categorization on friendship, taking characteristics (e.g. self-identifications) of both the observed and the observing individual into account. On data of 12 Hungarian high-school classes with one minority group, the Roma, we find that students of the majority group tend to select and keep friends whom they observe as majority members. In contrast, students of the minority group do not prefer other minority members when choosing friends, but tend to categorize their existing friends as minority peers. We conclude that these are two different manifestations of the preference for same-ethnic friends.

Quality and Stability of Cross-Ethnic Friendships: Effects of Classroom Diversity and Out-of-School Contact.

Cross-ethnic friendships are linked to a range of positive outcomes in adolescence, but have been shown to be lower quality and less stable than same-ethnic friendships. The current study examined how classroom diversity and out-of-school contact contribute to these relational differences between cross-and same-ethnic friendships. Multilevel analyses were conducted on a sample of 9,171 classroom-based friends nested within 4,333 ethnically diverse sixth grade students (54% female; 32% Latino, 20% White, 14% East/Southeast Asian, 12% African American, 14% Multiethnic, 8% Other ethnic). Consistent with the hypotheses, lower ethnic diversity in classes shared by friends and lack of home contact (as opposed to electronic) contributed to relational differences between cross- and same-ethnic friendships. The findings suggest that while diverse classrooms enable youth to bond across ethnic groups, connecting outside of school is critical for the relational quality and longevity of cross-ethnic friendships.

The role of teacher emotional support in children's cross-ethnic friendship preferences

The present study examined the role of observed teacher emotional support in children's preferences for cross- over same-ethnic friendships in elementary school classrooms. Grade, gender, and ethnic differences in the relations between teacher emotional support and children's friendship preferences were also examined. Participants were 1227 1st, 3rd, and 5th grade European American and African American students from 80 classrooms and their teachers followed longitudinally for one academic year. Our results revealed that teacher emotional support was positively associated with mean levels of cross-ethnic friendship preferences across the year among fifth grade boys only. Ethnicity did not moderate the relation between teacher emotional support and cross-ethnic friendship preferences. This study provides some of the first evidence that the positive effects of teacher warmth and responsiveness may extend to children's cross-ethnic sentiments.

How friendship is defined matters for predicting intergroup attitudes: Shared activities and mutual trust with cross-ethnic peers during late childhood and early adolescence

We examined how two different definitions of cross-ethnic friendships, namely reciprocal peer nominations for shared activities and mutual trust, predict attitudes towards immigrant students among non-immigrant Swiss children and early adolescents (N = 309). Among both Swiss children and early adolescents, only the number of mutually trusting peer nominations with immigrant students, but not the number of mutual nominations for shared activities, positively predicted inclusive intergroup attitudes. In addition, the perception of cooperation on a common goal in the classroom positively correlated with the number of cross-ethnic—but not same-ethnic—friends whom students trusted. We discuss the implications of our findings in relation to developmental research on the antecedents of intergroup attitudes and positive cross-ethnic relationships among children and early adolescents.

Befriending the same differently: ethnic, socioeconomic status, and gender differences in same-ethnic friendship

ABSTRACTThis study examines same-ethnic friendship variation between students from different ethnic, socioeconomic, and gender groups. Hypotheses based on a theoretical framework of opportunities, preferences, and third-party influence are tested on data of 11,063 students in English, German, Dutch, and Swedish school classes. Using structural equation modelling, the results indicate that ethnic groups differ in absolute and relative same-ethnic friendship because of different meeting opportunities with same-ethnic peers in class and a different status in the ethnic hierarchy. Socioeconomic status groups differ in same-ethnic friendship because socioeconomic status sorts students into more or less diverse school classes but not consistently so across countries and groups. Little further evidence is found for a relation between socioeconomic status and same-ethnic friendship preferences. Lastly, boys and girls do not seem to differ much regarding same-ethnic friendship.

Same-Ethnic, Interethnic, and Interracial Friendships Among Asian Early Adolescents.

This study examined the psychological functions of three friendship types (i.e., same ethnic, interethnic, and interracial) in a sample of 785 sixth-grade Asian students (Mage =11.5years). Participants listed their friends in sixth grade and whether each nominated friend was the same or a different ethnic group. They also reported on their ethnic identity, intergroup relations, and perceived school safety. Results showed that same-ethnic friendships were related to stronger ethnic identity and interracial friendships were uniquely related to school safety. Interethnic friendships (an Asian friend from a different country of origin) when perceived as same ethnic functioned similarly to same-ethnic friendships, whereas interethnic friendships perceived as from a different ethnic group, like interracial friendships, were associated with better intergroup relations. Implications for studying friendships in ethnically diverse samples are discussed.

Perceived ethnic discrimination and depressive symptoms: the buffering effects of ethnic identity, religion and ethnic social network.

PurposePerceived ethnic discrimination (PED) is positively associated with depressive symptoms in ethnic minority groups in Western countries. Psychosocial factors may buffer against the health impact of PED, but evidence is lacking from Europe. We assessed whether ethnic identity, religion, and ethnic social network act as buffers in different ethnic minority groups in Amsterdam, the Netherlands.MethodsBaseline data were used from the HEalthy Living In a Urban Setting study collected from January 2011 to June 2014. The random sample included 2501 South-Asian Surinamese, 2292 African Surinamese, 1877 Ghanaians, 2626 Turks, and 2484 Moroccans aged 18–70 years. Depressive symptoms were assessed using the Patient Health Questionnaire-9. PED was measured with the Everyday Discrimination Scale. Ethnic identity was assessed using the Psychological Acculturation Scale. Practicing religion was determined. Ethnic social network was assessed with the number of same-ethnic friends and amount of leisure time spent with same-ethnic people.ResultsPED was positively associated with depressive symptoms in all groups. The association was weaker among (a) those with strong ethnic identity in African Surinamese and Ghanaians, (b) those practicing religion among African Surinamese and Moroccans, (c) those with many same-ethnic friends in South-Asian Surinamese, Ghanaians, and Turks, and (d) those who spend leisure time with same-ethnic people among African Surinamese and Turks.ConclusionsEthnic identity, religion, and ethnic social network weakened the association between PED and depressive symptoms, but the effects differed by ethnic minority group. These findings suggest that ethnic minority groups employ different resources to cope with PED.

Ethnic Composition and Friendship Segregation: Differential Effects for Adolescent Natives and Immigrants.

Ethnically diverse settings provide opportunities for interethnic friendship but can also increase the preference for same-ethnic friendship. Therefore, same-ethnic friendship preferences, or ethnic homophily, can work at cross-purposes with policy recommendations to diversify ethnic representation in social settings. In order to effectively overcome ethnic segregation, we need to identify those factors within diverse settings that exacerbate the tendency toward ethnic homophily. Using unique data and multiple network analyses, the authors examine 529 adolescent friendship networks in English, German, Dutch, and Swedish schools and find that the ethnic composition of school classes relates differently to immigrant and native homophily. Immigrant homophily disproportionately increases as immigrants see more same-ethnic peers, and friendship density among natives has no effect on this. By contrast, native homophily remains relatively low until natives see dense groups of immigrants. The authors' results suggest that theories of interethnic competition and contact opportunities apply differently to ethnic majority and minority groups.

From neighbors to school friends? How adolescents’ place of residence relates to same-ethnic school friendships

This study examines to what extent adolescents’ place of residence is related to the opportunities and the preferences to befriend same-ethnic classmates. Analyzing 3345 students within 158 German and Dutch school classes, we find that sharing a neighborhood provides additional meeting opportunities to become friends in class as adolescents are likely to befriend classmates who live nearby them or who live nearby a friend of them (propinquity mechanism). However, this hardly explains why adolescent friendship networks in school classes tend to be ethnically homogeneous. Also, we find no convincing evidence that an adolescent's preference for same-ethnic friends in class varies with the share of outgroup members in his/her neighborhood (exposure mechanism).

Direct and interactive links between cross-ethnic friendships and peer rejection, internalizing symptoms, and academic engagement among ethnically diverse children.

The present study examined direct and interactive links between friendships and social, academic, and psychological adjustment problems (i.e., peer rejection as nominated by same-ethnic and cross-ethnic peers, teacher-reported academic engagement, and teacher-reported internalizing symptoms) among school-age children in multiethnic schools (n = 509, age: 9-10). The data, which included 2 time points with a 6-month interval, were drawn from a relatively large-sized, short-term longitudinal study. Results showed that cross-ethnic friendships (not same-ethnic friendships) were associated with greater academic engagement concurrently and predated decreased peer rejection and internalizing symptoms longitudinally, even after controlling for the availability of same-ethnic peers and classroom diversity. Furthermore, cross-ethnic friendships (not same-ethnic friendships) moderated the link between relational victimization and increased peer rejection and greater internalizing symptoms, such that this link was evidenced for children with fewer cross-ethnic friendships. However, the moderation effect was contingent upon the type of outcome variables and the ethnicity of the child. For example, the buffering effect against the negative contribution of relational victimization to internalizing symptoms was found particularly for African American children. The findings are discussed based on theories of normative development, ethnic socialization, and intergroup relations.

Ethnic segregation of friendship networks in school: Testing a rational-choice argument of differences in ethnic homophily between classroom- and grade-level networks

Adolescents’ school-based friendship networks tend to be segregated along ethnic lines. But few studies have examined whether variation in network boundaries affects the degree of ethnic friendship segregation. We use rational-choice theory to argue that ethnic homophily is more pronounced for friendships between classrooms than for those within classrooms. We empirically test this hypothesis using two-wave German panel data (N=1258) and stochastic actor-oriented models (RSiena). In line with our theoretical argument, we find that the tendency to form same-ethnic friendships is indeed stronger at the grade level, which translates into stronger ethnic segregation in friendship networks at the grade level than at the classroom level. Implications for research on ethnic segregation in school-based friendship networks are discussed.