Measures Of Self-identification Research Articles

What do measures of gender identity tell us about gender identity over time?

Gender identity is a multifaceted concept and is represented by a wide range of measures and constructs including both self-report and researcher observations of preferences and behaviours. However, despite their similar theoretical underpinning, gender identity measures are rarely found to correlate with one another, and contrasting patterns and trajectories are often found for each construct (Egan & Perry, Developmental Psychology, 37, 2001, 451). Therefore, this systematic review aimed to present a review of the longitudinal research evidence surrounding gender identity development in the absence of formal intervention. Using a systematic search strategy, 21 studies were identified. Narrative synthesis was used to synthesize the data collected in these studies and trajectories were explored for (1) self-identification measures of gender identity, (2) clothing preferences, (3) peer preferences, and (4) object/activity preferences. Overall, the results of this systematic review are consistent with wider research suggesting that distinct developmental patterns can be observed when using different constructs and measures of gender identity.

Adolescents' mutual acculturation attitudes and their association with national self-identification in three Swiss cantons.

Acculturation is a mutual process, meaning that members of minority as well as majority groups acculturate and thus experience cultural and psychological changes when having intercultural contact. This study assessed mutual acculturation attitudes in the school context through a four-dimensional measurement examining attitudes toward (1) migration background students' heritage culture maintenance and their (2) dominant culture adoption, (3) majority students' intercultural knowledge acquisition, and (4) schools' intercultural contact endorsement. Acculturation attitudes are commonly analyzed through minority and majority perspectives; however, the ways in which researchers categorize group members can differ significantly from how those members self-identify. This matters particularly for adolescents because they explore group identities and belongings. So far, adolescents' mutual acculturation attitudes have not been studied in relation to national self-identification measures. The current study addressed this research gap by analyzing mutual acculturation attitudes in relation to how strongly adolescents self-identify as (1) being Swiss, (2) having a migration background, and (3) the interaction of the two. The sample consisted of 319 adolescents in public secondary schools in three German-speaking cantons in Switzerland (45% female, Mage = 13.60 years, range 12-16). Latent profile analyses resulted in three distinct mutual acculturation profiles. The first is a mutual integration profile (n = 147, 46%), where minority and majority adolescents and schools are expected to integrate. The second is a multiculturalism profile (n = 137, 43%), with slightly lower expectations in all dimensions. The third is a cultural distancing profile (n = 33, 10%), which places particularly low expectations on majority adolescents and schools. Through an analysis of variance and a multiple logistic regression, those in the cultural distancing profile were found to identify significantly stronger as not having a migration background compared to those in the mutual integration profile. Thus, students having separation expectations toward minority students and non-involvement expectations toward schools and majority students are more likely to self-identify as not having a migration background than students having mutual integration expectations.

Do evaluation and self-identification relate to self-reported and actual social media use?

Background and aimsSocial media use can sometimes become excessive and damaging. To deal with this issue, scholars and practitioners have called for the development of measures that predict social media use. The current studies test the utility of evaluation and self-identification measures for predicting social media use.MethodStudy 1 examined the relation between evaluation (n = 58) and self-identification (n = 56) measures on the one hand and several self-report measures of social media use on the other hand. Study 2 examined whether the main results of Study 1 could be replicated and whether evaluation (n = 68) and self-identification (n = 48) also relate to actual social media use. We probed evaluation and self-identification using implicit and explicit measures.ResultsExplicit evaluation and self-identification measures significantly correlated with several of the self-report measures of social media. Explicit evaluation also significantly correlated with several indices of actual social media use. Implicit measures did not relate to social media use.Discussion and conclusionsThe current results suggest that researchers and practitioners could benefit from using explicit evaluation and self-identification measures when predicting social media use, especially an evaluation measure since this measure also seems to relate to actual social media use. Study 2 was one of the first to test the ecological validity of social media use measures. Although implicit measures could provide benefits for predicting social media use, the current studies did not show evidence for their predictive utility.

The Curious Case of Black Conservatives: Construct Validity and the 7-point Liberal-Conservative Scale

Scholars have long puzzled over the existence of conservative-identifying black Americans who nonetheless identify with and vote for the Democratic Party. This paper resolves this paradox. Leveraging data from the American National Election Study, I demonstrate that the terms “liberal” and “conservative” are unfamiliar to many black Americans, rendering the commonly used 7-point liberal-conservative measure of ideology invalid for this population. Black respondents unfamiliar with these terms misapply them and choose ideological labels that fail to reflect their partisan preferences. Consequently, scholars and political actors make incorrect and imprecise inferences about the contours of black politics in the United States. Moreover, this article raises new concerns about the generalizability of claims that rely on ideological self-identification measures, including popular claims about polarization among the mass public. This work also suggests a need for caution when using concepts that vary in their meaningfulness across social groups.

Ethnic attrition, assimilation, and the measured health outcomes of Mexican Americans.

The literature on immigrant assimilation and intergenerational progress has sometimes reached surprising conclusions, such as the puzzle of immigrant advantage which finds that Hispanic immigrants sometimes have better health than US-born Hispanics. While numerous studies have attempted to explain these patterns, almost all studies rely on subjective measures of ethnic self-identification to identify immigrants' descendants. This can lead to bias due to "ethnic attrition," which occurs whenever a US-born descendant of a Hispanic immigrant fails to self-identify as Hispanic. In this paper, we exploit information on parents' and grandparents' place of birth to show that Mexican ethnic attrition, operating through intermarriage, is sizable and positively selected on health, making subsequent generations of Mexican immigrants appear less healthy than they actually are. Consequently, conventional estimates of health disparities between Mexican Americans and non-Hispanic whites as well as those between Mexican Americans and recent Mexican immigrants have been significantly overstated.

Race/Ethnicity, Perceived Skin Color, and the Likelihood of Adult Arrest.

Research has long-documented racial/ethnic disparities in criminal justice outcomes. However, despite race/ethnicity being a multidimensional social construct, prior research largely relies on self-identification measures, thereby disregarding research on skin tone stratification within-racial/ethnic groups. The current study extends beyond this by examining the relationship between race/ethnicity and arrest employing both self-identified race/ethnicity and perceived skin color. Using data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health, we explore the main and intersecting effects of self-identified race/ethnicity and perceived skin color on experiencing an arrest in adulthood between- and within-self-identified Whites, Blacks, Latinos, Native Americans, and Asians. We use structural disadvantage as a framework for exploring how social structural factors as well as antisocial behavior mediate the relationship between race/ethnicity/color and arrest. Results suggest that focusing on the racial/ethnic disparities alone masks differences in arrest by color and that the effect of color varies by race/ethnicity. Results also suggest that measures indicative of disadvantage, but not offending, partially explain these associations.

Navigating ethnicity in Peru: a framework for measuring multiple self-identification among indigenous Quechua women

ABSTRACTThis article maps the particular statistical representation of diversity that becomes visible when Quechua ethnoracial identification in Peru is framed as multiple. It does so against a backdrop of uncertainty regarding how to categorize the heterogeneity and complexity of subpopulations, which arise when multiple ascriptions are considered. Using the 2007–2008 Peruvian Demographic and Health Surveys, which provide data of women of reproductive age, the study examines how indigenous Quechua women self-identify and what factors affect their choices. We modeled the relationship between a number of cultural and sociodemographic variables and a self-identification measure that offered respondents the opportunity to identify with multiple ethnoracial categories and to ascribe to them with different degrees of intensity. Challenging the prevailing contraposition between indigeneity and mestizaje, the study reveals that multiple self-identification can yield relevant insights into cultural diversity and sociodemographic variability within the Quechua population, and offers an acceptable trade-off between the reductionism of single option self-identification and the maximized validity of unprompted open response methods.

Ethnic Attrition and the Observed Health of Later-Generation Mexican Americans

Numerous studies find that U.S.-born Hispanics differ significantly from non-Hispanic whites on important measures of human capital, including health. Nevertheless, almost all studies rely on subjective measures of self-identification to identify immigrants' U.S.-born descendants. This can lead to bias due to ethnic attrition, which occurs whenever a U.S.-born descendant of a Hispanic immigrant fails to self-identify as Hispanic. This paper shows that Mexican American attritors are generally more likely to display health outcomes closer to those of non-Hispanic whites. This biases conventional estimates of Mexican American health away from suggesting patterns of assimilation and convergence with non-Hispanic whites.

Religious and national group identification in adolescence: A study among three religious groups in Mauritius

Religious group identification is an important but understudied social identity. The present study investigates religious group identification among adolescents of different faiths (Hindu, Muslim, Christian) living in multicultural Mauritius. It further explores how religious and national group identities come together among religious majority and minority adolescents. For three age groups (11 to 19 years, N = 2152) we examined the strength of adolescents' religious and national group identification, the associations between these two identities, and the relationships to global self-esteem. Across age and religious group, participants reported stronger identification with their religious group than with the nation. Identification with both categories declined with age, with the exception of Muslims, whose strong religious identification was found across adolescence. The association between religious and national identification was positive, albeit stronger for the majority group of Hindus and for early adolescents. We examined the manner in which religious and national identities come together using a direct self-identification measure and by combining the separate continuous measures of identification. Four distinct clusters of identification (predominant religious identifiers, dual identifiers, neutrals, and separate individuals) that were differently associated with global self-esteem were found. Dual identifiers reported the highest level of global self-esteem. The clusters of identification did not fully correspond to the findings for the direct self-identification measure. The results are discussed in terms of the meaning of dual identity and the positive manner in which adolescents can manage their multiple identities while taking into account the ideological framework in which those identities are played out.

Bearing the burden of whiteness: the implications of racial self-identification for multiracial adolescents' school belonging and academic achievement

Previous literature on racial self-identification among multiracials demonstrates that self-identification differs by context. Moreover, among multiracial adolescents, identity, usually measured in school, is correlated with achievement. In addition, a few studies have indicated that for half-white, half-minority adolescents, school achievement falls in between the achievements of their monoracial counterparts. Using the in-school and in-home components of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health), we examine the relationship between racial self-identification and school belonging and achievement. We find that among black/white and Asian/white adolescents, adolescents who self-identify as white are particularly disadvantaged in school, reporting lower grade point averages (GPA) than their multiracial counterparts. Our conclusions suggest that multiple contextual measures of self-identification better capture the relationship between racial identification and academic achievement among multiracial adolescents.

Race and Ethnic Self-Identification Influences on Physical and Mental Health Statuses Among Blacks

We examine if commonly used distress measures, rates of psychiatric disorders, and chronic health conditions are affected by alternate measures of race-ethnicity for African Americans and Caribbean blacks. We examined two alternative self-identification measures to investigate if their influence might differ. A study on national household probability sample of non-institutionalized African Americans (n = 3,570) and blacks from Caribbean countries, who now live in the United States (n = 1,621), was conducted between February 2001 and June 2003, using a slightly modified version of the Composite International Diagnostic Interview. The method used to measure black race and ethnicity has influence on physical and mental health outcomes. The distributions of depressive symptoms are not affected, while the distributions of DSM IV disorders and chronic health conditions vary by race and ethnic self-identifications among the African American and Caribbean black populations. There are serious implications of using alternate measures of race-ethnicity on the distribution of physical and mental health morbidity among African Americans and Caribbean blacks. The conceptualization and assessment of race-ethnicity should be carefully considered when studying mental and physical health statuses and service needs in the American black population.

Comments on Adolescent Peer Crowd Affiliation: A Response to Cross and Fletcher (2009)

According to Cross and Fletcher (2009), there is currently no one “accepted definition of the adolescent crowd” which is the reason why “the boundaries of the crowd are not sufficiently delineated” (p. 753) in the existing methodological approaches. Hence, they argue, “without a decision about who is to be studied (i.e., how to define the crowd)” the current approaches in studying adolescent crowds are prone to making “both Type I- and Type II-like errors” (p. 753). A Type-I-like error would occur when someone is wrongly classified to a crowd, the “null hypothesis” being that he or she is not a member of that group. A Type-II-like error would occur when someone is not rightly classified as a member of a crowd to which they belong. Thus, higher Type-I- and Type-II-like errors represent concepts similar to specificity and sensitivity in epidemiology. In our view, despite the differences in methodologies used to study adolescent peer crowds, one may infer a consensus across research studies regarding what adolescent peer crowds signify. Researchers in general tend to agree that adolescent peer crowd affiliation represents the tendency of adolescents “to place themselves and others into consensually recognized and labeled social types” (Sussman et al. 2007, p. 1). Undoubtedly, adolescent peer crowd affiliation represents a phenomenon involving a complex interplay among different types of self- and other-related social perceptions such as adolescents’ perceptions of themselves, their perceptions of what their peers perceive them to be, their peers’ actual perceptions of them, and how they would want their peers to perceive them. The diverse approaches taken to conceptualize and operationalize peer crowd affiliation in the current literature attest to the complexity of the peer crowd phenomenon. However, as illustrated by Sussman et al. (2007), the convergence of findings related to peer crowd names and characteristics across a methodologically varying set of studies suggests a general consensus among researchers regarding the nature of the peer crowd construct itself. That said, we do agree that more future research is needed to better understand the factors that influence adolescent crowd membership and the extent to which peer social network overlaps with peer crowd affiliation. We find Cross and Fletcher’s (2009) concern for sensitivity and specificity an important one. Although they don’t identify a method that might strike the right balance between specificity and sensitivity, we would welcome an advance in this direction. However, it should be noted that researchers have taken some precautions to increase the sensitivity and specificity of their measures. For example, in a self-identification measure an open-ended option is usually included for subjects to report the crowd names that do not appear on the provided list of names (Sussman et al. 2000, 2004). We agree with Cross and Fletcher (2009) that adolescents’ identification with multiple groups poses a common methodological problem in the study of peer crowds. More research that examines multiple crowd identification is needed. Also, more research is needed to determine the relative impact of each crowd on the behavior of adolescents who identify with multiple groups. This is a different sort of research question, of course, from asking youth to indicate the crowd about which they most closely identify. We feel that both types of research have value.

The relationship among ethnic identity, psychological well-being, and intergroup competence: an investigation of two biracial groups.

This study examined the ethnic identification, psychological well-being, and intergroup competence of biracial individuals. Using a self-identification measure, the authors explored whether biracial individuals would identify with one, both, or none of their ethnic heritages and the implications of these orientations on psychological well-being and intergroup competence. Sixty-six Black/White and Asian/White individuals were included. Not differing between the 2 biracial groups, results revealed that participants were most likely to be biculturally identified, followed by minority identified and then nonidentified. Furthermore, psychological well-being and intergroup anxiety varied as a function of identity. Suggestions for future research with biracial identity are discussed.

The Emergence of Mass Partisanship in Russia, 1993-1996

Previous studies of Russia search for party identification an all-or-nothing fashion. We adopt an alternative approach to studying the emergence of mass partisanship new democracies. In accordance with established theories, we argue partisanship develops over time and evidence of partisanship its early stages may be found basic behavioral and attitudinal indicators. We stipulate three expectations for the emergence of partisanship: (1) attachment grows with the cumulative effect of political experience; (2) as attachment grows, other views -acquire greater partisan consistency; and (3) attachments have a rational basis. Guided by these expectations, we use panel survey data from early elections to distinguish nascent partisans. Comparison of the behavior of partisans identified by our approach to the behavior of partisans identified using self-reported party identification measures raises doubts about how well self-identification measures capture partisanship this context. ccording to received wisdom during much of its first decade, postcommunist Russia has shown little promise of acquiring a stable party system or mass partisan alignment (Hill 1994; Sakwa 1995; Shevtsova 1995; Nogee and Mitchell 1997). Instead, Russia's parties are commonly regarded as impotent, personalistic, and undifferentiated, and the party system as a whole appear[s] to be suspended perpetual crisis (Fish 1995, 340; see also WVhite, Wyman, and Kryshtanovskaya 1995, 183; Parrot 1997, 17-18; Urban and Gel'man 1997, 175). A seminal work on Russian elections, How Russia Votes, concludes in Russia more than three quarters of the electorate lack any party identification(White, Rose, and McAllister 1997, 135) and that most people are not partisans the Western sense and the majority are to a significant degree anti-party (137). Recent empirical work challenges the prevailing view. Miller and colleagues detect a sizable growth partisanship throughout the decade and have started to study the forces behind it (Miller, Reisinger, and Hesli 1998; Miller and Klobucar 1999). Evans and Whitefield (1998) contend a party system has indeed been evolving Russia (see also Fish 1995; Whitefield and Evans 1998, 1999). Despite these important developments, however, the well-entrenched view of party system as chaotic, shapeless, and lacking mass partisanship persists (Gel'man and Golosov 1998; Hough 1998; Robinson 1998; Rose, Mishler, and Haerpfer 1998). For observers of Russian politics, an accurate assessment of mass partisanship can shed light on the promise of stability this fledgling democ-

Equivalence of Lifestyle Dimensions Across Four Major Subcultures in Canada

This study investigates the relationship between ethnicity and lifestyles in the context of multiple ethnic group comparisons involving English, French, Italian, and Greek Canadians. The ethnic identification scheme used is based on the self-identification measure. Four separate factor analyses were compared using canonical correlation, and the four factor structures were found to be similar. This allows the comparison of the four groups in a common factor structure. Fourteen main factors were generated and the four groups exhibited major differences in thirteen dimensions, with or without controlling for five socio-demographic variables. Very clear lifestyle patterns emerge for each group.