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Is Diversity Enough? Exploring Intergroup Friendships In Italian Multiethnic Schools, Cinzia Pica-Smith, Rina Manuela Contini, Bob Ives
Is Diversity Enough? Exploring Intergroup Friendships In Italian Multiethnic Schools, Cinzia Pica-Smith, Rina Manuela Contini, Bob Ives
Human Services and Rehabilitation Studies Department Faculty Works
Italian schools are increasingly diverse spaces in which children of different racial and ethnic backgrounds, religious beliefs, and cultural-linguistic practices interact daily. Thus, these spaces provide fertile ground for a continuum of relational experiences from positive intergroup relationships and friendships to tensions and experiences of discrimination and marginalization. Research has demonstrated that diverse spaces can be ideal for positive intergroup contact, intergroup dialogue and the formation of intergroup friendship, which have been associated with prejudice reduction and a decrease in intergroup anxiety. Employing a theoretical framework based on intergroup contact theory (Allport, 1954) and research on intergroup friendships, (Pettigrew & …
A Cross-Cultural Study Of Italian And U.S. Children's Perceptions Of Interethnic And Interracial Friendships In Two Urban Schools, Cinzia Pica-Smith, Davide Antognazza, Joshua J. Marland, Alberto Crescentini
A Cross-Cultural Study Of Italian And U.S. Children's Perceptions Of Interethnic And Interracial Friendships In Two Urban Schools, Cinzia Pica-Smith, Davide Antognazza, Joshua J. Marland, Alberto Crescentini
Human Services and Rehabilitation Studies Department Faculty Works
This cross-cultural and cross-sectional study investigated Italian and US children’s perceptions of interethnic and interracial friendships, also known as intergroup friendships. A total sample of 226 children attending two urban, elementary schools in a middle-sized Northeastern US city and a middle-sized northern Italian city, were interviewed employing the questionnaire. Results indicate that Italian and US children’s perceptions of intra-racial and interracial friendships differed with students of color in the US rating intragroup friendships more positively than intergroup ones. In addition, students of color in Italy and white students in the US rated intergroup and intragroup friendships similarly.