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The Theory of Racial Socialization in Action for Black Adolescents and Their Families

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Diversity and Developmental Science

Abstract

Racial socialization research emerged in opposition to the corpus of theories and studies that failed to include youth of color in research conceptualization and research designs. Informed by 12 years of observational research, I present the Theory of Racial Socialization in Action (TRSA). I present a conceptual framework for the TRSA and describe the evidence that undergirds its four theoretical assumptions. This chapter also describes the ways the TRSA complements and extends both foundational and newer theories in racial socialization theory. This chapter also describes the development of the Racial Socialization Observational Task and Coding System (RSOTCS), a measurement tool designed to assess observed race-related communication for use with African American adolescents and their families. This chapter concludes with a discussion of the applications of the TRSA and the RSOTCS to families of different racial-ethnic backgrounds. Suggestions for adapting the RSOTCS for use with families of different racial-ethnic backgrounds are provided in this chapter.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    This chapter will focus on racial socialization specifically, but the author recognizes the broad use of ethnic-racial socialization for families of different racial and ethnic backgrounds. The author uses the terms African American and Black interchangeably to refer to children and families who identify with Black American racial and cultural experience in the United States.

  2. 2.

    The Center for the Study of Black Youth in Context at the University of Michigan and the Family and Community of Health Study (Simons et al., University of Georgia) and are good examples of longitudinal studies with representative samples of Black children containing meaningful, useful coverage of race-related constructs.

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Acknowledgments

The National Institute of Mental Health (1R21MH083986-01A1) and the Purdue Research Foundation funded this research. The author thanks Tony Johnson and Indy Parks & Recreation, City of Indianapolis, Indiana, for assistance with data collection in the early stages of this research. The author expresses her gratitude to the families who participated in this research described in this chapter.

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    Mia A. Smith-Bynum

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    Gabriela Livas Stein

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Smith-Bynum, M.A. (2023). The Theory of Racial Socialization in Action for Black Adolescents and Their Families. In: Witherspoon, D.P., Stein, G.L. (eds) Diversity and Developmental Science. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-23163-6_4

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