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Acculturative Stress And Gang Involvement Among Latinos: U.S.-Born Versus Immigrant Youth, Alice N. Barrett

Psychology Honors Theses

Quantitative and qualitative data from the 2002 Latino Adolescent Transition Study were used to explore differences in acculturative stress and gang involvement between foreign-born and U.S.-born Latino middle school students. Regression analyses showed significant interactions between discrimination stress and immigration status as well as adaptation stress and immigration status. U.S.-born youths were significantly more likely to be gang-involved if they experienced discrimination stress. They were also less likely to be gang-involved if they experienced high adaptation stress. A minority of primarily foreign-born youths identified economic inequality and prejudicial attitudes as factors that differentiated them from Americans. Those reporting economic inequality …