Parental Ethnic-Racial Socialization and Social Attitudes Among Ethnic-Racial Minority and White American Emerging Adults

This article utilizes moderated mediation analyses to explore whether the relations between parental ethnic-racial socialization (PERS) dimensions and social attitudes differ across ethnicracial minority (n = 128) and White (n = 131) college-going emerging adults. We examined social dominance orientation (SDO) as an index of antiegalitarian intergroup attitudes and attitudes toward interpersonal harmony as an index of interpersonal attitudes. We tested whether there were ethnic-racial variations in mediation models in which each type of PERS dimension was expected to be linked to greater antiegalitarian attitudes (greater SDO), which, in turn, was predicted to be associated with less prosocial attitudes (lower harmony enhancement). Results indicated that more frequent cultural socialization and preparation for bias were linked to greater SDO for the White sample, but not for the ethnic-minority sample. Moderation results were nonsignificant for promotion of mistrust, with results indicating a positive link to SDO, regardless of racial-ethnic status. Moderated mediation analyses further revealed indirect effects of cultural socialization and preparation for bias on interpersonal attitudes through SDO for the White sample, but not for the ethnic-minority sample. Specifically, greater cultural socialization and preparation for bias each were linked to greater SDO, which, in turn, was associated with less positive perceptions of the value of maintaining interpersonal harmony for White respondents. Practical applications, including social justice implications, of the results and possibilities for future research are discussed.