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About this paper symposium
| Panel information |
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| Panel 30. Solicited Content: Anti-Racism Research or Interventions |
| Paper #1 | |
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| “We probably don’t talk about it with those words”: White U.S. American parents’ racial socialization practices | |
| Author information | Role |
| Lauren Kinnard, UCLA, United States | Presenting author |
| A. Durazi, UCLA, United States | Non-presenting author |
| T. Hazelbaker, The College of St. Scholastica, United States | Non-presenting author |
| V. W. Huynh, CSUN, United States | Non-presenting author |
| C. Gillen-O’Neel, Macalester College, United States | Non-presenting author |
| Abstract | |
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Objectives: In recent years, there has been a strong call to action for white U.S. Americans to actively engage in becoming anti-racist by working to dismantle white supremacy and structural racism. One way for white parents to engage in anti-racism is through racial socialization (RS), but even when white parents express a desire to be anti-racist, they often adopt color-evasive RS approaches. Hence, there is a need to understand what white parents do to socialize their children as well as how they reason about their RS decisions. Methods: The current study examines semi-structured interviews conducted in 2018 with 35 white parents (M = 45.6, SD =6.5; 31 mothers) with at least one white child aged 5-14 years. Participants were recruited from a Midwestern city in which the BLM movement has been active due to local police brutality. Participants were asked about their RS goals and practices. The current study uses a Consensual Qualitative Research (Hill & Knox, 2021) procedure to examine RS practices, and data analysis is ongoing. Results: Emergent themes highlight three aspects of parents’ RS: process, content, and reflections. RS process involved race-related conversations, encouraging interactions, friendships or community with people of color, modeling (i.e., parents exhibiting race-conscious behaviors/attitudes), and utilizing various sources of education (e.g., media, workshops) for themselves and their children to learn about race/racism. Importantly, all participants reported discussing race/racism with their children. RS content included historical racism, policing and police shootings, appreciation for cultural diversity, responses to racist behaviors of family members and children. Less frequently, parents explicitly discussed their children’s white racial identity with them, addressed (white) privilege, or talked about structural racism. Parents’ RS reflections included barriers (e.g., lack of diverse environments) and facilitators (e.g., school social justice lessons) to RS, and perceptions of their own RS competency. Rarely, parents reflected on how whiteness influenced their RS practices. Conclusions: Overall, white U.S. American parents in this study were willing to have conversations about race and racism with their children, albeit to different extents. Some parents utilized color-evasive RS approaches and language that upholds white supremacy, and key aspects of anti-racism, namely socialization about white privilege, structural racism, and anti-racist action, were infrequent. Findings underscore that although white parents engage in RS with their children, their practices fail to reach the level of antiracism. Building anti-racist RS competency amongst white parents is critical for working toward a racially just society. Further analyses will examine the data from a developmental lens to understand how child age may influence RS practices and further investigate how parents’ RS practices accommodate or resist racism and progress toward antiracism. |
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| Paper #2 | |
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| Maintaining whiteness in a superdiverse context: white German parents’ racial-ethnic socialization | |
| Author information | Role |
| Philipp Jugert, University of Duisburg-Essen, Germany | Presenting author |
| Marie J. Kaiser, University of Duisburg-Essen, Germany | Non-presenting author |
| Ursula Moffitt, University of New Mexico, United States | Non-presenting author |
| Carolin Hagelskamp, HWR Berlin, Germany | Non-presenting author |
| Abstract | |
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Introduction: This study investigates the racial-ethnic socialization (RES) practices among white German parents residing in a superdiverse urban area. The increasing racial-ethnic diversity in Western European cities, coupled with persistent systemic racism and white supremacy, provides a critical context for examining how white parents educate their children about race and ethnicity. The research aims to understand the domains and nuances of RES within white families, recognizing the pivotal role parents play in shaping their children's perceptions of racial dynamics. Methods: To explore these dynamics, we conducted qualitative interviews with 12 white German parents of elementary school-aged children. The participants were selected to ensure they represented families without an immigrant background, thereby focusing on the perspectives of those traditionally seen as part of the majority culture in Germany. The interviews centered around the parents' beliefs, practices, and approaches to discussing racial-ethnic issues with their children. We employed reflexive thematic analysis to identify key themes and patterns in the data. Results: Four primary themes emerged from the analysis: silence about race and racism, adherence to white normativity, overt reinforcement of racism, and diversity socialization. The theme of silence reflected parents' reluctance to discuss race openly, often justified by a belief that their children would naturally understand diversity. Adherence to white normativity involved upholding an implicit notion that being German equates to being white, which sustains racial boundaries and exclusivity. Some parents exhibited behaviors that overtly reinforced racism, such as expressing fears or negative stereotypes about racial-ethnic minorities. In contrast, diversity socialization was observed when parents promoted acceptance and appreciation of diversity, though often in superficial ways that did not challenge systemic inequities. The findings suggest that RES among white German parents operates as a mechanism that can either maintain or challenge white supremacy. All parents conveyed messages that reflected both a tacit acceptance of white privilege and an emerging awareness of inequality. Despite living in a superdiverse context, most parents continued to center their socialization practices around white norms, thus perpetuating systemic racism through everyday interactions and beliefs. However, the presence of pro-diversity messages indicates a potential shift toward greater racial-ethnic awareness and inclusivity. Conclusions: The study highlights the need for targeted interventions that support parents in bridging the gap between awareness and action. Such interventions could equip parents with the tools to engage more deeply with issues of race and racism, thereby fostering environments that challenge rather than uphold white supremacy. This research contributes to a broader understanding of how RES in white families can impact societal structures and the intergenerational transmission of racial attitudes. It underscores the importance of addressing RES in efforts to promote racial equity and justice in increasingly diverse societies. |
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| Paper #3 | |
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| Content and structure of race-related conversations in U.S. white families adopting antiracist parenting practices | |
| Author information | Role |
| Inés Botto, M.Ed., University of Wisconsin-Madison, United States | Presenting author |
| Margaret L. Kerr, University of Wisconsin-Madison, United States | Non-presenting author |
| David A. Hilgendorf, University of Wisconsin-Madison, United States | Non-presenting author |
| Yingfei Le, University of Wisconsin-Madison, United States | Non-presenting author |
| Larissa G. Duncan, University of Wisconsin-Madison, United States | Non-presenting author |
| Abstract | |
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Children raised in the United States are surrounded by racially biased beliefs and persistent, structural racial inequities. Within this system, white children typically develop a “racial frame” underscored by racial stereotypes and denial of racism, maintaining the racial status quo in a new generation. White parents’ proactive scaffolding of children’s racial learning may interrupt this process and support downstream development of “counter-frames” that support racial justice actions. Given an increasing desire among white parents to counter normative white socialization practices, we sought to understand how racial knowledge is co-constructed between white parents and their preschool-aged children. Drawing from a social-constructivist perspective, we used knowledge graphing to explore the content and structure of parent-child conversations about race and racism within white families adopting antiracist socialization practices. Data were drawn from a pilot study of an antiracist parent training that taught white parents to engage in proactive racial socialization practices. Twice, parents were asked to “record yourselves having a conversation about race or racism with your child,” resulting in 21 recordings across 14 participants (12 mothers; 2 fathers). Participants identified as non-Hispanic white, lived in the Midwestern U.S., and had at least one 3-6-year-old child. We coded transcribed recordings via conventional content analysis following a consensus coding approach. We transformed the codes into a network of concepts based on how often codes were discussed in relation to each other using MAXQDA’s proximity mapping tool. Four distinct clusters emerged: racial literacy, power and advocacy, interpersonal activism, and whiteness. Codes within the racial literacy cluster occurred most frequently and focused on discussions of phenotype (e.g., skin color, hair texture) or defining key words (e.g., race, racism, antiracism). These concepts were frequently connected to conversations about power/advocacy and interpersonal activism. The power/advocacy cluster included discussions of inequity from a structural lens, such as working to change unfair rules. The interpersonal activism cluster framed empathy and prosociality as a means of challenging racism. The few, disconnected conversations about whiteness attempted to problematize white habitus or discuss whiteness as a means of reinforcing unequal resource distribution. The content and structure of these conversations reveals that the white families in this study moved beyond conversations about skin color, connecting the idea of race to concepts of racism and challenging racial injustice, potentially yielding a more nuanced understanding of race’s function in society. These conversations mark a departure from familial avoidance of discussions of racial injustice typical of white racial socialization, especially with younger children. Whiteness, however, remains an overlooked topic of conversation, despite its undergirding of U.S. racial inequality. As information processing structures, the schemas that white children develop can disrupt or reinforce the racial status quo. Overall, the findings suggest that some white parents may engage in productive conversations that counter racial stereotypes and focus on challenging racism, but additional support may help white parents integrate a structural understanding of whiteness that better scaffolds white children’s development of antiracist “counter-frames.” |
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| Paper #4 | |
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| A Collaborative Caregiver-Child Anti-Racism Program (CCARP): Pilot mixed methods findings | |
| Author information | Role |
| Dr. Genevieve Alice Woolverton, Brigham and Women's Hospital, United States | Presenting author |
| Amy K. Marks, Boston University, United States | Non-presenting author |
| Abstract | |
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Objectives: Using our integrative model for the development of anti-racism in White youth (Woolverton & Marks, 2022), we developed a Collaborative Caregiver-Child Anti-Racism Program (CCARP), a five-week-long caregiver-child anti-racism training program for White families (i.e., caregiver-child dyads). We used qualitative methods to evaluate the feasibility and acceptability of CCARP, quantitatively measured pre- and post-CCARP variables, and used mixed methods to characterize the racial ethnic socialization (RES) practices of White mothers. Methods: 25 White U.S.-born participants, consisting of eleven mothers and fourteen children (Mage = 9.69, SD = 2.18; 71.43 % girls, 21.43% boys, 7.14% gender nonbinary), enrolled in CCARP. Participation included pre-CCARP questionnaires assessing anti-Black racial bias, racism knowledge, white privilege awareness, and mother RES practices. The CCARP program included four weeks of curricula, wherein mothers taught children evidence-based lessons about race, racism, white privilege, and anti-racism. The fifth week consisted of a qualitative interview focused on participant feasibility and acceptability and administration of post-CCARP questionnaires, which were identical to pre-study questionnaires. Inductive thematic analyses were used to analyze interview data; convergent mixed methods were used to analyze RES data. Results: All participants found CCARP to be feasible and acceptable. Children most enjoyed integrated activities and videos; mothers found guided conversations (i.e., scripts and prompts) to be most beneficial in teaching racism-related topics. Child knowledge about racism, t(6) = -4.56, p = .004, and white privilege awareness, t(6) = -2.76, p = 0.03, significantly increased after CCARP participation, and child racial bias against Black Americans decreased: t(6) = -2.65, p = .02. In terms of RES, all mothers were completely misaligned with explicit racist socialization practices before and after CCARP, expressing negative emotions about such practices. Mean alignment with color-blind RES ranged from somewhat misaligned to completely misaligned before and after CCARP. Mean alignment with egalitarian RES ranged from completely aligned to somewhat aligned, with no changes pre- to post-CCARP. Mean color conscious RES pre-CCARP was somewhat aligned, with significantly more alignment with color conscious RES post-CCARP. Qualitative data elucidated that caregivers became increasingly sure that racism and/or white privilege were the most likely reasons for differential treatment based on race after participating in CCARP. Conclusions: We find that a structured educational program about racism and anti-racism can be implemented within White families with a high degree of participant-reported feasibly and acceptably. Pilot data indicates possible effectiveness of CCARP in increasing child knowledge about racism and white privilege, decreasing child anti-Black bias, and increasing mother color conscious RES. Looking forward, the promising findings derived from this preliminary evaluation of CCARP support comparing the effects of the program to a control group in the future and evaluating the program on a larger scale. |
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Racial-ethnic socialization within White families: content, processes, interventions and downstream consequences
Submission Type
Paper Symposium
Description
| Session Title | Racial-ethnic socialization within White families: content, processes, interventions and downstream consequences |