White Racial Identity Research Articles

“Constant dropping wears away a stone”: Chinese international women instructors’ duoethnography on advancing racial equity

Faculty of color are constantly experiencing trauma and racial inequities in inherently Eurocentric educational spaces where their histories, knowledge, and experiences are delegitimized and marginalized. Employing critical race feminism (CRF) and White racial identity development model, this article details ways in which two Chinese international women instructors grappled with tensions and trauma and celebrated (small) joys and successes within Predominantly White Institutions (PWI) in the United States. We drew on duoethnography, a dialogic methodological approach grounded in social justice, to make meaning of, (re)construct, and advance racial equity in pedagogy. We examined and analyzed four sources of data: our personal narratives, transcripts of eight Zoom meetings, reflection journals, and informal conversational exchanges. We identified three strategies for navigating dissonance and conflicts: 1) being vulnerable, 2) recognizing shared and differing marginalization or privileges, and 3) building allies intentionally and strategically.

In service of disruption: examining mediators of White racial identity through inservice professional development addressing race and racism

ABSTRACT Research on professional development (PD) with practicing White teachers has traditionally focused on shifting White teachers’ attitudes, whereas more recent research has explored the role of emotions in White teachers’ engagement in such learning. Leveraging theory on culturally disruptive pedagogy and a qualitative phenomenological approach, this article analyses the experiences of a group of White educators across a suburban Mid-Atlantic district, asking, what common elements are associated with ‘disruptions’ White educators may experience in PD addressing race and racism? Building on previous research calling attention to the complex, multifaceted nature of White cultural conditioning and related processes of ‘unlearning’, cognitive, emotional, spatial, and embodied mediating elements are documented and analysed. Implications for future research and PD design and facilitation are discussed.

Participants' Engagement With and Results From a Web-Based Integrative Population Mental Wellness Program (CHAMindWell) During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Program Evaluation Study.

The COVID-19 pandemic involved a prolonged period of collective trauma and stress during which substantial increases in mental health concerns, like depression and anxiety, were observed across the population. In this context, CHAMindWell was developed as a web-based intervention to improve resilience and reduce symptom severity among a public health care system's patient population. This program evaluation was conducted to explore participants' engagement with and outcomes from CHAMindWell by retrospectively examining demographic information and mental health symptom severity scores throughout program participation. We examined participants' symptom severity scores from repeated, web-based symptom screenings through Computerized Adaptive Testing for Mental Health (CAT-MH) surveys, and categorized participants into symptom severity-based tiers (tier 1=asymptomatic to mild; tier 2=moderate; and tier 3=severe). Participants were provided tier-based mindfulness resources, treatment recommendations, and referrals. Logistic regressions were conducted to evaluate associations between demographic variables and survey completion. The McNemar exact test and paired sample t tests were performed to evaluate changes in the numbers of participants in tier 1 versus tier 2 or 3 and changes in depression, anxiety, and posttraumatic stress disorder severity scores between baseline and follow-up. The program enrolled 903 participants (664/903, 73.5% female; 556/903, 61.6% White; 113/903, 12.5% Black; 84/903, 9.3% Asian; 7/903, 0.8% Native; 36/903, 4% other; and 227/903, 25.1% Hispanic) between December 16, 2020, and March 17, 2022. Of those, 623 (69%) completed a baseline CAT-MH survey, and 196 completed at least one follow-up survey 3 to 6 months after baseline. White racial identity was associated with completing baseline CAT-MH (odds ratio [OR] 1.80, 95% CI 1.14-2.84; P=.01). Participants' odds of having symptom severity below the clinical threshold (ie, tier 1) were significantly greater at follow-up (OR 2.60, 95% CI 1.40-5.08; P=.001), and significant reductions were observed across symptom domains over time. CHAMindWell is associated with reduced severity of mental health symptoms. Future work should aim to address program engagement inequities and attrition and compare the impacts of CHAMindWell to a control condition to better characterize its effects.

White Racial Identity, Racial Attitudes, and Latino Partisanship

AbstractWhile partisanship in American politics has been historically tied to racial identity and racial attitudes, most studies of Latino partisanship do not incorporate these factors into understanding their partisan attachments. I argue that the concepts of race, color, and mestizaje as they are understood within Latino communities in the United States can influence political attitudes and partisanship among Latinos themselves. Using six consecutive Cooperative Election Study (formerly Cooperative Congressional Election Study) surveys I examine how self-identification as white, racial resentment, and color-blind attitudes influence Latino partisanship. I find that white racial identity has a small but significant positive association with Republican partisanship among Latinos, and a negative association with Democratic partisanship. Additionally, negative racial attitudes among Latinos are strongly related to identification as Republican, even when controlling for ideology and other factors like immigrant generation and religion. These results have important implications for understanding current and future Latino voting patterns.

Racial identity and concussion diagnosis and recovery trajectories in collegiate athletes: a LIMBIC MATARS investigation

ABSTRACT Objective To determine if there were concussion diagnosis and recovery disparities between collegiate athletes with Black and White racial identities. Design Retrospective cohort study. Methods Concussion information was extracted from NCAA athlete medical files at LIMBIC MATARS member institutions from the 2015–16’ to 2019–20’ academic years. A total of 410 concussions from 9 institutions were included that provided all independent (i.e. racial identity of Black or White) and dependent variable information (i.e. dates of injury, diagnosis, symptom resolution, and return to sport) that were analyzed using Mann-Whitney U tests. The sample consisted of 114 (27.8%) concussions sustained by Black athletes and 296 (72.1%) sustained by White athletes. Results The overall sample had a median of 0 days between injury occurrence to diagnosis, 7 days to symptom resolution, and 12 days to return to sport. No significant timing differences were observed for concussion diagnosis (p = .14), symptom resolution (p = .39), or return to sport (p = 0.58) between collegiate athletes with Black versus White racial identities. Conclusions These findings may reflect equitable access to onsite sports medicine healthcare resources that facilitate concussion management in the collegiate sport setting. Future work should explore these associations with a larger and more diverse sample of collegiate athletes.

Associations of DNA-methylation measures of biological aging with social disparities in child and adolescent mental health.

Children who experience environmental adversities are at increased risk of both internalizing and externalizing disorders. Epigenetic mechanisms may regulate the influence of environmental adversities on mental health. We examined the hypothesis that salivary DNA-methylation patterns of pace of biological aging (DunedinPoAm) and inflammation (DNAm-CRP) are socially stratified and associated with mental health in 1,183 children (609 female, age M=13.6y) from the Texas Twin Project. Analyses were preregistered. Participants' DNA-methylation algorithms and psychiatric symptoms differed by socioeconomic contexts and race/ethnicity. Children with more parent-reported internalizing symptoms had higher DunedinPoAm and DNAm-CRP scores, and children with more aggression problems had higher DNAm-CRP. DunedinPoAm partially mediated advantage of White racial identity on internalizing. Similarly, DNAm-CRP partially mediated advantage of higher family socioeconomic contexts and, in a separate model, White racial identity on reduced internalizing symptoms. Children's epigenetic measures of pace of biological aging and inflammation are associated with social inequalities and mental health.

White Racial Identity and Its Link to Support for Far-Right Groups: A Test of a Social Psychological Model

Prior research indicates that far-right political groups tend to be disproportionately composed of and supported by white people. Drawing off the group identity and developmental literature, we add theoretical clarity to this relationship. We argue that a salient white racial identity motivates people to explore social contexts that affirm the value of being white. Many of these contexts (e.g., conservative media) reinforce and instill beliefs in conspiracies, perceptions of racial threat, and a legitimization of group hierarchies, which are defining features of far-right ideologies. As people develop a strong white racial identity, they should thus view far-right groups more favorably. Drawing off survey data from a national US sample of 903 white young adults, we tested a mediation model positing that the effects of a strong white racial identity with support for four far-right groups (the January 6 protesters, QAnon, the Proud Boys, and the Oath Keepers) would be mediated by enhanced levels of conspiratorial ideation, perceived racial threat, and social dominance orientation. We found that the effects of white racial identity with support for all four groups were mostly or completely accounted for by these three mediating factors. We discuss the implications of this research for the racial identity and far-right groups literatures.

Book Review: Tyler Edward Stovall, White Freedom: The Racial History of an Idea, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2021.

The book is the last published project of late Fordham University professor Tyler Stovall. All his previous work was devoted to French history, but in his last book he opened up the scope of his analysis to include the United States in order to explore how ideas of freedom in the modern world have been racialized (5), eventually becoming what he calls “white freedom”, the belief (and practice) that freedom is central to white racial identity, and that only white people can or should be free (11). Stovall published a well-researched and beautifully written book in order to explain this paradox (an apparently all-inclusive notion, such as freedom as understood in the modern world being restricted to a certain category of people and denied to the rest of humanity).

White privilege critical consciousness, racial attitudes, and intergroup anxiety among parents and adult children in White families

ABSTRACT Prejudice and discrimination toward Black individuals in the U.S. serves to maintain White privilege. This research integrated the tenets of social cognitive theory (Bandura, 1977) and White racial identity theory (Helms, 1990) to examine intraindividual associations (i.e., within a single person) and interindividual associations (i.e., between family members) among parents’ and adult children’s critical consciousness of their White privilege, (anti)racist attitudes, and intergroup anxiety. We also tested a series of mediation paths from parents’ White privilege critical consciousness to children’s outcomes to explore potential mechanisms by which racial attitudes and behaviors are associated among family members. This study highlights the intricate nature of White privilege in White families, and their links to both progressive and harmful race-related attitudes and behaviors.

Cognitive barriers to leading for racial equity as a White education leader: a qualitative study

Leading for racial equity in public education involves courageously addressing entrenched systems of racism and oppression that routinely advantage White students and disadvantage students of color. Engaging in uncomfortable discussions about race and racism amongst colleagues within an organization can generate internal struggles of fear and anxiety of negative reactions. This study employs a constructive developmental lens, specifically the Immunity to Change (ITC) Mapping process, to understand the connections between racial identity development and intrinsic barriers to leading for racial equity of White leaders. Through examining 18 ITC maps, we identify anxieties and fears that create significant barriers for White education leaders who intend to champion racial equity. Our study reveals that White education leaders, regardless of their progress on the continuum of White racial identity development, struggle with courageously leading for racial equity because they are firmly planted in the socializing mind, limiting their effectiveness because of self-constructed, cognitive fears of negative reactions from others. Practical implications for education leaders, education policy makers, and students are also provided.

“They didn’t really have key experiences that they thought they could bring to the table”: Perceptions of white racial absolution during cross-racial intergroup dialogues

AbstractThis article analyzes how White racial absolution, a form of White resistance to interrogating White racial identity through discourse, impedes cross-racial intergroup dialogs (IGDs) and impacts the IGD experience of Students of Color (SOC). Eleven undergraduate IGD students and six undergraduate IGD facilitators participated, and critical race discourse analysis (CRDA) was used for analysis. Findings showed that White students engaged in White racial absolution by avoiding White racial sharing (WRS), or side-stepping conversations regarding their Whiteness. The three themes around WRS included (a) Whiteness as a justification to not contribute to the IGD, (b) offering surface-level commentary regarding Whiteness, and (c) leaning on other social-identity-based marginalities or summoning the racial experiences of People of Color. Implications from this study illustrate that White racial absolution within cross-racial IGD alienates SOC, which stifles the overarching goal of resolving gaps between people of diverse social identity backgrounds.

Pride or Prejudice? Clarifying the Role of White Racial Identity in Recent Presidential Elections

Pride or Prejudice? Clarifying the Role of White Racial Identity in Recent Presidential Elections

"Black people don't love nature": white environmentalist imaginations of cause, calling, and capacity.

I examine how white British members of a London-area environmental group conceptualize race in relation to ecological disasters. Based on a five-year (2018-2022) ethnographic study, members employed racialized narratives and symbolic boundaries to construct who was the cause of disasters, who had the moral responsibility or calling to remediate disasters, and who possessed the adequate resources and capacity to fix disasters. Together, these narratives formed a tripartite racial imaginary which functioned to demarcate the symbolic boundaries of an ideal, white racial identity that was intimately crocheted with notions of authentic guilt and remorse, responsibility and liability, work ethics, competent knowledge, resource mobilization, moral commitment, and racial paternalism and superiority. Through the pursuit of this White racial ideal, members frequently conceptualized ecological disasters throughout the non-white world as the fault of specific actions by non-White people, identified unique racialized actors as the proper responsible parties for working on the remediation of ecological disasters, and also assigned particular White people from Westernized, industrial, democratic states as the only people in possession of the appropriate knowledge, resources, and character to clean-up and manage a healthy environment.

Critical Whiteness Studies as Self-Work for White Nonprofit and Government Workers

Social equity researchers in public administration regularly refer to self-work as important or even crucial for White public servants seeking to authentically engage in racial justice efforts. Yet no papers in the field define self-work nor deliberately provide tools for White people to do it. Self-work for White racial justice advocates acknowledges racialized trauma and gives White public servants tools to understand White double-consciousness. I develop a model to support the argument that Critical Whiteness Studies (CWS)—the subset of critical race theory dedicated to understanding how the White racial identity contributes to racial hierarchy—is a powerful tool for self-work of White public servants. CWS has four assumptions: (1) Whiteness as property, (2) racial denial, (3) White privilege, and (4) the mutation of Whiteness. Each of these is based on the premise that White people are separate from their Whiteness, allowing them to engage with others who wish to end racism by adopting strategies to reconstruct or abolish Whiteness in society. In conclusion, I use critical autoethnography of racialized trauma to assess how CWS helped me become a better White public servant.

Indexing Whiteness to American Design

This essay argues that the Index of American Design helped transform understandings of White racial identity in the United States during the second quarter of the twentieth century. In the wake of the Immigration Act of 1924, Euro-Americans were seen less as a malignant horde of separate races and more as a benign collection of ethnicities that made up a unified White or “Caucasian” race. The Index of American Design, a Works Progress Administration Federal Art Project of 1936–1942 that produced thousands of illustrations documenting decorative arts before 1900, constructed a canon of American art around these White ethnic groups. The Index excluded most objects made by Native, African, and Asian Americans and instead sought out “folk art” produced by relatively isolated or archaic groups descended from European immigrants. By celebrating the diversity of White Americans and presenting their material culture as the basis for a unified American art, the Index of American Design helped codify White racial formation and its underpinning of American national identity.

White Kids on the Block: On Race, Identity and Criminality Among Incarcerated White Youth.

This study contributes to efforts already underway to attend to the reproduction of white supremacy and the ways whiteness manifests across contexts. We examine whiteness and white racial identity development among incarcerated youth, both a group and place not often studied in relation to these two concepts. Using critical ethnographic methods, we explore how processes of white identity development unfold among incarcerated white youth and the ways in which whiteness is lived, negotiated, and challenged within the carceral context. Findings suggest that white youth used pre-existing racial scripts about race, whiteness, and criminality to make sense of and navigate life in the carceral context. Still, we found that these racial scripts were often seeped in anti-black racist logics about criminality in service of whiteness and the construction of superior white identities.

Confronting Whiteness in Developmental Science: Disrupting the Intergenerational Transmission of White Racism.

This special section situates White racial socialization (WRS) in its rightful place-in the context of White supremacy. The first article offers a conceptual framework to guide research on White adolescents' racial identity development in this context. The second employs a critical ethnographic approach to explore White racial identity development among incarcerated White adolescents. Additional studies use qualitative, observational, and mixed methods to understand WRS practices in White families. The final article presents a conceptual model of digital WRS. Authors provide recommendations for future research, such as engaging in critical researcher self-reflexivity and focusing on content of racial socialization messages. Two commentaries highlight cross-cutting themes and urge developmental scientists to view this special section as a call to action.

“I Think It’s Too Early to Know”: Gender Identity Labels and Gender Expression of Young Children With Nonbinary or Binary Transgender Parents

Little is known about gender expression among children with transgender parents. In the United States, we surveyed 64 nonbinary or binary transgender parents of children aged 18 to 71 months. Most parents reported a marginalized sexual identity and a White racial identity. Many declined to label their child’s gender identity, and this was particularly true among those with younger children. Scores indicated that, on average, children’s play was conventionally gendered. However, scores indicated significantly more gender-expansive play in the present sample than in normed samples, particularly among children assigned male at birth. Findings support transfamily theory (McGuire et al., 2016) and illustrate differences among families with nonbinary and binary transgender parents.

‘We’re a bit browner but we still belong to the white race’: making whiteness in the context of South-South migration in Chile

ABSTRACT In the context of rising South-South migration to Chile, this article examines how Chileans redefine and claim whiteness in a multicultural working-class neighborhood in Santiago. It contributes to regional racial studies by analyzing how whiteness is constructed in multicultural neighborhoods where different national and racialized identities that share a colonial past converge, and where the nation-state has historically pursued a progressive whitening through the adoption of racist state policies. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork, I show how Chileans construct a white racial identity vis-à-vis the presence of, and through ordinary interactions with, Latin American and Caribbean migrants. As is the case elsewhere, in contemporary Chile whiteness is an ongoing everyday social construct that is not only conveyed as a discourse, but also through the practice or performance of power in the social textures of urban life. Making and enacting whiteness becomes a way in which racial hierarchies of belonging are materialized to achieve a higher status in an unequal racialized society. This study reveals how Chileans claim to be ‘white(r)’ than the South-South migrants they interact with, reproducing a Chilean hegemonic discourse about national identity, through the many practices of everyday life. The article’s main argument is that making whiteness through these ordinary occurrences reproduces anti-indigenous and anti-black racism.

Immigration Threat Amplifiers and Whites’ Immigration Attitudes in the Age of Trump

The US public’s immigration attitudes have become more favourable in recent years, yet the Trump administration (2017-2021) was the most restrictionist on immigration of any modern US presidency. What key sociopolitical factors were associated with holding more exclusionary immigration attitudes and policy preferences among US whites, the ethnoracial group most likely to support Trump, at the beginning of his administration? Analyses of two waves of nationally representative US panel survey data for whites demonstrate that voting for Trump, consuming conservative news, being evangelical, and having a stronger white racial identity were linked with more exclusionary abstract immigration attitudes and/or support for one more Trump-era policies: the US-Mexico wall, the Travel Ban targeting majority-Muslim countries, and deportations of unauthorised immigrants. Together, our results emphasise the value of attending to multiple aspects of the national sociopolitical context, considering diverse potential sources that amplify immigration threat, and jointly examining abstract immigration attitudes and specific policy preferences of varying salience.