Abstract
The present study was designed to examine trajectories of personal identity coherence and confusion among Hispanic recent-immigrant adolescents, as well as the effects of these trajectories on psychosocial and risk-taking outcomes. Personal identity is extremely important in anchoring young immigrants during a time of acute cultural change. A sample of 302 recently immigrated (5 years or less in the United States at baseline) Hispanic adolescents (Mage = 14.51 years at baseline; SD = 0.88 years, range 14–17) from Miami and Los Angeles (47 % girls) completed measures of personal identity coherence and confusion at the first five waves of a six-wave longitudinal study; and reported on positive psychosocial functioning, depressive symptoms, and externalizing problems at baseline and at Time 6. Results indicated that identity coherence increased linearly across time, but that there were no significant changes in confusion over time and no individual differences in confusion trajectories. Higher baseline levels of, and improvements in, coherence predicted higher levels of self-esteem, optimism, and prosocial behavior at the final study timepoint. Higher baseline levels of confusion predicted lower self-esteem, greater depressive symptoms, more aggressive behavior, and more rule breaking at the final study timepoint. These results are discussed in terms of the importance of personal identity for Hispanic immigrant adolescents, and in terms of implications for intervention.
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Funding
Preparation of this article was supported by Grant DA026594 (Seth J. Schwartz and Jennifer B. Unger, Co-Principal Investigators) from the National Institute on Drug Abuse.
Authors’ Contributions
S.J.S. wrote the grant application that funded the project, served as co-principal investigator, and led the drafting of the manuscript. J.B.U. served as co-principal investigator and contributed to manuscript preparation. A.M. and T.K.L. conducted the study analyses. E.I.L.-B., L.B.C.-G., M.A.C., B.P.-W., J.S., B.L.Z., D.C., and A.J.R. made substantive contributions to editing and revising the manuscript. D.W.S., J.A.V., K.M.L., S.E.D.R., and M.P. managed the data collection and oversaw the day-to-day project activities.
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The authors declare that they have no competing interests.
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The study was approved by the Institutional Review Boards at the University of Miami and the University of Southern California, as well as by the Research Review Boards at the participating school districts.
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Informed consent was obtained from parents, and informed assent was obtained from adolescents. Adolescents who turned 18 during the course of the study were asked to provide informed consent.
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An erratum to this article is available at http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10964-016-0625-9.
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Schwartz, S.J., Unger, J.B., Meca, A. et al. Personal Identity Development in Hispanic Immigrant Adolescents: Links with Positive Psychosocial Functioning, Depressive Symptoms, and Externalizing Problems. J Youth Adolescence 46, 898–913 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10964-016-0615-y
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10964-016-0615-y