The Racial and Ethnic Identity Formation Process of Second‐Generation Asian Indian Americans: A Phenomenological Study

This phenomenological study elucidates the identity development processes of 12 second‐generation adult Asian Indian Americans. The results identify salient sociocultural factors and multidimensional processes of racial and ethnic identity development. Discrimination, parental, and community factors seemed to play a salient role in influencing participants’ racial and ethnic identity development. The emergent Asian Indian American racial and ethnic identity model provides a contextualized overview of key developmental periods and turning points within the process of identity development. Este estudio fenomenológico dilucida los procesos de desarrollo de la indentidad de 12 individuos Americano‐Indoasiáticos adultos. Los resultados identifican factores socioculturales destacados y procesos multidimensionales del desarrollo de la identidad racial y étnica. Los factores de discriminación, paternos y comunitarios parecieron jugar un papel destacado en su influencia sobre el desarrollo de la identidad racial y étnica de los participantes. El modelo emergente de identidad racial y étnica Americano‐Indoasiática proporciona una visión general contextualizada de los periodos clave del desarrollo y los puntos de inflexión durante el proceso del desarrollo de la identidad.     

Psychological Brain Drain: Interviews with Emigrant South African Psychologists

Interviews with 15 emigrant South African psychologists revealed that they left South Africa mainly for two reasons, the policies of the government and the academic situation. In this article, we report on this group's interest in psychology, commonalities between them, and their views on South African psychology.     

Negotiating Racial Identity

Abstract

Counseling research on racial identity development among multiracial people has largely overlooked the complexity of these individuals' social experiences and how their multiple realities result in various racial identities. The assumptions that individuals with one Black and one White parent can only understand themselves as “Black” or “biracial” have been socially, culturally and politically constructed, providing a misguided foundation for models of racial identity. Here, we present findings from a study of 177 biracial individuals that illustrate the multidimensionality of racial identity among this population. We focus on the mechanism of interactional validation in identity construction to better understand the particular dilemmas faced by biracial women and formulate appropriate therapeutic approaches.     

Synesthesia Affects Verification of Simple Arithmetic Equations

To investigate the effects of color–digit synesthesia on numerical representation, we presented a synesthete, called SE, in the present study, and controls with mathematical equations for verification. In Experiment 1, SE verified addition equations made up of digits that either matched or mismatched her color–digit photisms or were in black. In Experiment 2A, the addends were presented in the different color conditions and the solution was presented in black, whereas in Experiment 2B the addends were presented in black and the solutions were presented in the different color conditions. In Experiment 3, multiplication and division equations were presented in the same color conditions as in Experiment 1. SE responded significantly faster to equations that matched her photisms than to those that did not; controls did not show this effect. These results suggest that photisms influence the processing of digits in arithmetic verification, replicating and extending previous findings.     

The varying effects of age of acquisition

There are a number of theories that suggest that age of acquisition (AoA) effects are not uniform across different tasks. Catling and Johnston (2006a) found greater AoA effects within an object-naming task than in a semantic classification task. They explained these findings by suggesting that AoA effects might accumulate according to how many levels of representation a task necessitates access to. Brysbaert and Ghyselinck (2006) explain the difference in AoA effects by proposing two distinct types of AoA (frequency dependent and frequency independent), the first accounted for by a connectionist-type mechanism and the latter situated at the interface between semantics and word production. Moreover, Moore, Smith-Spark, and Valentine (2004) and Holmes and Ellis (2006) have suggested that there are two loci of AoA effects: at the phonological level and somewhere within the perceptual level of representation. Again, this could account for the varying degrees of AoA effects. This study sets about testing these ideas by assessing the effect size of AoA across a series of different tasks that necessitate access to various levels of representation. Experiments 1–4 demonstrate significant effects of AoA in a novel picture–picture verification task, an object classification task, a picture verification task, and an object-naming task. Experiment 5 showed no effects of initial phoneme on the naming of the critical objects used within Experiments 1–4. The implication of the varying AoA effect sizes found within Experiments 1–4 in relation to explanations of AoA are discussed.     

Looking down and ramping up: The impact of status differences on effort in intergroup contexts

This paper examines how the status of an out-group impacts effort in intergroup settings. The results provide evidence that people work harder when their individual performance is compared to a lower, as opposed to higher, status out-group member. Moreover, comparisons to a lower status out-group were found to elicit motivation gains as these participants worked harder than participants in the control (Studies 1-3) or in-group comparison conditions (Studies 2 and 3). In Study 4, evidence for the role of threat as an underlying mechanism was provided as gains in effort for those compared with a lower status out-group member were eliminated when participants self- or group-affirmed prior to comparison. Finally, Study 5 shows that both social identity threat and self-categorization threat underlie increases in effort for participants compared to a lower status out-group member. We detail a theoretical basis for our claim that performance comparisons with lower status out-group members are especially threatening, and discuss the implications for this research in terms of social identity and self-categorization theories as they relate to effort in intergroup contexts.     

Assimilation ideology and situational well-being among ethnic minority members

Two experimental questionnaire studies were conducted to test whether assimilation ideology affects the relationship between ethnic self-esteem and situational well-being of Turkish-Dutch participants. Social identity theory argues that ethnic identity can buffer the effects of group identity threat on well-being, and self-esteem research suggests that a positively evaluated self-aspect can form an important source of well-being. Results show that in an assimilation context, ethnic self-esteem is positively related to feelings of global self-worth and general life-satisfaction. The findings suggest that ethnic self-esteem is an important factor for well-being in an assimilation context that undermines minority group members ability to live their ethnic identity and threatens their group’s positive distinctiveness.     

What's in a name? Typicality and relatedness effects in children

We studied how category typicality and out-of-category relatedness affect speeded category verification (vote "yes" if pictured object is clothing) in typically developing 4- to 14-year-olds and adults. Stimuli were typical and atypical category objects (e.g., pants, glove) and related and unrelated out-of-category objects (e.g., necklace, soup). Typical and unrelated out-of-category objects exhibited preferential processing (faster reaction times and fewer errors). Variations in typicality and relatedness disproportionately influenced children's performance, with developmental improvement associated with both verbal and nonverbal factors. Underextension versus overextension errors seemed to be associated with independent factors, namely multifaceted maturational factors versus receptive vocabulary skill, respectively. Errors were infrequent, suggesting spontaneous taxonomic classification by all participants. An experiment with printed words in adults replicated results, indicating that typicality and relatedness effects reflected organizational principles of the semantic system, not picture-related processes. This research establishes the viability of an online approach to assessing automatic components of semantic organization in children.     

The Atomistic Self versus the Holistic Self in Structural Relation to the Other

I argue that meaning or significanceper se, along with the capacity to be conscious thereof, and the values, motives and aspirations, etc. central to the constitution of our intrinsic personal identities, arise, as indeed do our extrinsic social identities, and our very self-consciousness as such, from socio-cultural structures and relations to others. However, so far from our identities and behavior therefore being determined, I argue that the capacity for critical reflection and evaluation emerge from these same structural relations, the more complex and quintessentially human aspects of our behavior being explained not in terms of responses to stimuli but as choices reflecting our evaluation of meaningful or significant alternatives. Finally I provide theoretical grounds for accepting the existence of other subjects and give a holistic, as opposed to a dialectical, account of the way individuals may challenge and change the very socio-cultural ways of relating to and interacting with others so central to constituting their capacities and identities.