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Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance (1999)

Chapter: 9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California

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Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

CHAPTER 9
Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation of Children of Immigrants in Southern California

Rubén G. Rumbaut

While the rapid growth of international migration to the United States over the past few decades has led to a mushrooming research literature and an intensified public debate about the new immigrants and their impact on American society, less noticed has been the fact that all the while a new generation of Americans raised in immigrant families has been coming of age. In due course its members will decisively shape the character of their ethnic communities and their success or failure. Indeed, the long-term effects of contemporary immigration will hinge more on the trajectories of these youth than on the fate of their parents. The children of immigrants thus constitute the most consequential and lasting legacy of the new mass immigration to the United States (cf. Portes, 1996; Rumbaut, 1995; Zhou, 1997).

The size of this youthful population—including both immigrant children and U.S.-born children of immigrants—has already surpassed the prior record set by the offspring of European immigrants earlier in this century. Among children under 18 years of age, the 1990 census counted nearly 6 million U.S.-born children living with immigrant parents and another 2 million foreign-born children ages 0 to 17, combining to form a "new second generation" of some 8 million children as of that time (see Oropesa and Landale, 1997). By 1998 the immigrant population of the United

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

States increased even faster—from 20 million to 27 million—with the number of children of immigrants growing commensurately. Furthermore, while one-third of the immigrant population of the United States resided in California, over 40 percent of under-18 children of immigrants lived in California. Hence, the size and concentration of this emerging population, added to its diverse national and socioeconomic origins and forms of adaptation, make its present evolution extraordinarily important.

This chapter presents the latest results of a comprehensive longitudinal study of the educational performance and social, cultural, and psychological adaptation of children of immigrants, the new second generation now growing up in American cities. Since late 1991 the Children of Immigrants Longitudinal Study has followed the progress of a large sample of teenagers representing over 70 nationalities in two key areas of immigrant settlement in the United States: Southern California (San Diego) and South Florida (Miami and Fort Lauderdale). The original survey, conducted in spring 1992 (T1), interviewed over 5,200 students enrolled in the eighth and ninth grades in schools of the San Diego Unified School District (N = 2,420) and the Dade and Broward County Unified School Districts (N = 2,842). The sample was drawn in the junior high grades, a level at which dropout rates are still relatively rare, to avoid the potential bias of differential dropout rates between ethnic groups at the senior high school level. For purposes of the study, students were eligible to enter the sample if they were U.S. born but had at least one immigrant (foreign-born) parent or if they themselves were foreign born and had come to the United States at an early age, most before age 10. (For selected T1 results and further information on its research design, see Portes, 1995, 1996; Portes and Rumbaut, 1996; Portes and Schauffler, 1996; and Rumbaut 1994a, 1995, 1997a.)

Three years after the original survey, in 1995-1996 (T2), a second survey of the same group of children of immigrants was conducted—this time supplemented by in-depth interviews with a stratified sample of their parents as well—using survey questionnaires specially developed for longitudinal and comparative analyses. The purpose of this follow-up effort was to add a temporal dimension to the study and ascertain changes over time in the family situation, school achievement, educational and occu-

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

pational aspirations, language use and preferences, ethnic identities, experiences and expectations of discrimination, and social and psychological adaptation of these youth. By this time the children, who were originally interviewed in junior high when most were 14 or 15 years old (the mean age at T1 was 14.2), had reached the final year of senior high school and were making their passages into adulthood, firming up plans for their future as well as their outlooks on the surrounding society. This chapter examines a wide range of findings from that latest survey, focusing on changes observed over time (from T1 to T2) among youth in the San Diego longitudinal sample and also on two key indices of psychological well-being: self-esteem and depression.

IMMIGRANTS AND THEIR TYPES: THE SAN DIEGO LONGITUDINAL SAMPLE

Reflecting patterns of recent immigration into Southern California, the principal nationalities represented in the San Diego sample are Mexican, Filipino, Vietnamese, Laotian, Cambodian, and smaller groups of other children of Asian immigrants (mostly Chinese, Japanese, Indian, Korean) and Latin American immigrants. These groups are representative of some of the principal types of immigrants in California today and in contemporary American society (cf. Portes and Rumbaut, 1996). Thus:

  • Mexicans constitute by far the largest legal and illegal immigrant population in both California and the United States—indeed, they form part of the largest, longest, and most sustained labor migration in the contemporary world—and San Diego, situated along the Mexican border, has long been a major area of settlement. The 1990 census showed that among adults over 25 Mexican immigrants had the lowest education levels of any major U.S. ethnic group, native or foreign born (see Rumbaut, 1994b).

  • Since the 1960s, Filipinos have formed the second-largest immigrant population in this country, and they are the largest Asian-origin immigrant group in California and the United States. Many have come as professionals (nurses most conspicuously) and through military connections (especially the U.S. Navy, making San Diego with its huge Navy base a primary area of settle-

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

ment). The 1990 census showed that Filipino immigrants as a whole have the lowest poverty rate of any sizable ethnic group in the United States.

  • Since the end of the Indochina war in 1975, refugees from Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos have formed the largest refugee population both in California and the United States. The 1990 census found the highest poverty and welfare dependency rates in the country among Laotians and Cambodians. Comparative research on the mental health of Indochinese refugees and other ethnic groups has also found the highest levels of depressive symptomatology and posttraumatic stress disorder among the adult survivors of the "killing fields" of Cambodia—raising questions about the psychological well-being of their children in the United States (see Rumbaut, 1991a, 1991b, 1996; Vega and Rumbaut, 1991).

Remarkably, although the 27 million immigrants in the United States in 1998 came from over 140 different countries, fully 35 percent came from only three: Mexico, the Philippines, and Vietnam. More remarkably still, these three nationalities accounted for the majority (55 percent) of the 8.1 million foreign-born people in California in 1996. And fully 90 percent of this study's San Diego sample consisted of children of parents from Mexico; the Philippines; and Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia—representing distinct groups of immigrant laborers, professionals, and refugees with sharply contrasting migration histories and contexts of exit and reception.

The 1995-1996 survey in San Diego succeeded in reinterviewing 85.2 percent of the baseline sample of 2,420 students, for a total of 2,063 (see Table 9-1 for reinterview rates by national origin and gender). Students who had moved, transferred, or dropped out of school during the intervening years were followed throughout, and even the majority of dropouts were located and reinterviewed. It was because of the difficulty in tracking these harder-to-locate cases that the data collection period extended into 1996. With some exceptions (e.g., higher-status youth from intact families who owned their own homes in San Diego at T1 were better represented at T2), the sample is largely the same. In fact, Indochinese students from the poorest

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

TABLE 9-1 Reinterview Rates and Sociodemographic Characteristics of Children of Immigrants in San Diego, California, by National Origin of Their Parents and Gender of the Children

Characteristicsa

Mexico

Philippines

Vietnam

Cambodia

N of sample, T1 (1992)

727

808

361

94

N of sample, T2 (1995-1996)

578

716

302

88

% Reinterviewed at T2

80.0

88.6

83.7

93.6

Nativity of Children

 

 

 

 

% Foreign born

38.8

43.4

84.4

97.7

% U.S. born

61.2

56.6

15.6

2.3

Year of Birth

 

 

 

 

% 1975-1976

18.1

17.0

23.5

22.7

% 1977

45.3

51.5

42.4

44.3

% 1978

36.6

31.5

34.1

33.0

Year of U.S. Arrival

 

 

 

 

% Born in United States

61.2

56.6

15.6

2.3

% 1976-1979

10.2

10.3

20.9

11.4

% 1980-1984

10.2

15.1

35.8

62.5

% 1985-1990

18.3

18.0

27.8

23.9

U.S. Citizenship

 

 

 

 

% Citizen at T1 (1992)

69.2

78.6

32.5

6.8

% Citizen at T2 (1995)

73.4

85.6

46.4

11.4

Nativity of Parentsb

 

 

 

 

Parents are conationals

73.7

79.5

89.7

80.7

One parent born in United States

17.8

16.9

2.3

0.0

a Data are from the longitudinal sample of 2,063 respondents surveyed in 1992 (T1) and again in 1995-1996 (T2). When originally interviewed in spring 1992, all respondents were enrolled in the eighth or ninth grades in the San Diego City Schools; eligible respondents had to have at least one parent who was foreign born.

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

 

Laos

 

 

 

 

 

Characteristicsa

Lao

Hmong

Othersc

Female

Male

Total

N of sample, T1 (1992)

154

53

223

1,211

1,209

2,420

N of sample, T2 (1995-1996)

143

50

186

1,040

1,023

2,063

% Reinterviewed at T2

92.9

94.3

83.4

85.9

84.6

85.2

Nativity of Children

 

 

 

 

 

 

% Foreign born

95.8

94.0

47.3

55.3

56.0

55.6

% U.S. born

4.2

6.0

52.7

44.7

44.0

44.4

Year of Birth

 

 

 

 

 

 

% 1975-1976

36.3

12.0

17.2

16.2

23.3

19.8

% 1977

41.3

52.0

45.7

47.7

46.1

46.9

% 1978

22.4

36.0

37.1

36.1

30.6

33.3

Year of U.S. Arrival

 

 

 

 

 

 

% Born in United States

4.2

6.0

52.7

44.7

44.0

44.4

% 1976-1979

20.3

22.0

9.1

13.2

12.3

12.7

% 1980-1984

46.9

46.0

17.2

21.5

22.3

21.9

% 1985-1990

28.7

26.0

21.0

20.6

21.4

21.0

U.S. Citizenship

 

 

 

 

 

 

% Citizen at T1 (1992)

16.8

8.0

68.8

59.0

59.5

59.3

% Citizen at T2 (1995)

23.8

12.0

73.7

66.1

66.2

66.1

Nativity of Parentsb

 

 

 

 

 

 

Parents are conationals

95.1

90.0

58.6

78.6

79.2

78.9

One parent born in United States

0.0

0.0

31.2

14.2

13.8

14.0

b When the parents were not conationals (i.e., not born in the same country), the mother's nationality determined the child's national origin classification, except where the mother was U.S. born. Over 50 different nationalities (countries of birth of fathers and mothers) were represented in the sample overall.

c Includes smaller immigrant groups from Asia (Chinese, Indian, Japanese, Korean, Thai), Latin America, and the Caribbean.

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

families in the survey (the smaller-sized Cambodian, Lao, and Hmong groups) had reinterview rates above 90 percent, as did the high socioeconomic status ''other Asians" (Chinese, Japanese, Indian, Korean). No nationality had reinterview rates below 80 percent. The percentages of female and foreign-born youth were the same at both points in time. As during the baseline survey, this data collection effort for the most part took place during repeated visits to schools with the cooperation of the San Diego City Schools, including administrators, principals, teachers, and other staff.

CHILDREN OF IMMIGRANTS: A PORTRAIT

Basic demographic characteristics of the longitudinal sample of 2,063 (those youth interviewed in both surveys) are provided in Table 9-1, including their birthplace, year of birth, year of arrival in the United States, and U.S. citizenship status at T1 and T2, broken down by the national origin of their parents and gender. Some points merit highlighting. The sample is about evenly balanced between foreign-born and U.S.-born children of immigrants. However, most of the Mexicans (61 percent) and Filipinos (57 percent) were born in the United States, reflecting long-established migration histories, while the Indochinese groups, a legacy of U.S. involvement in the war in Vietnam and its spread into Cambodia and Laos, are all overwhelmingly foreign-born recent arrivals. The 16 percent of Vietnamese who were born in the United States comprise a salient and historically important exception, as will become clearer in what follows: they are largely the children of the comparatively elite "first wave" of South Vietnamese who were evacuated as Saigon fell in April 1975 (over 80 percent of the youth in the sample were born in 1977 or 1978, and none were born before 1975).

Too often analysts who rely on nativity and ethnicity data, such as those available through the decennial census, tend to conceive of ethnicity as a fixed quality or constant (e.g., "Mexican," "Vietnamese") and of nativity as a sort of continuous variable (i.e., a proxy for generation or time in the United States) and to assume that differences between foreign-born and U.S.-born co-ethnics reflect processes of change (typically of assimilation) over time or

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

generation. But here the confounding of period and cohort effects can loom large, missing the importance of class and other differences between heterogeneous "waves" and "vintages" of immigrants from the same country in different historical contexts (as the example of the 1975 Vietnamese exiles illustrates). It can also miss the crucial importance of intermarriage among non-compatriots, as the data on parental nativity suggest (see the bottom panel of Table 9-1). In our sample, about three-fourths of the parents were conationals (the other fourth consisted of mothers and fathers who were not born in the same country—representing over 50 nationalities overall); and in 14 percent of the cases one parent was U.S. born (ranging from virtually none of the Indochinese to one-sixth of the Mexicans and Filipinos and nearly one-third of the "others"). Thus, far from being a fixed characteristic, the very assignment of national origin to the children in our sample became fluid and problematic in a substantial proportion of cases. In such cases where the parents were not conationals, the mother's nationality determined the child's national origin classification, except where the mother was U.S. born, in which case the father's nationality was determinative (for an elaboration of this methodological problem, see Rumbaut, 1994a).

Substantive results of the adaptive trajectories of these children of immigrants from approximately the beginning (T1) to the end (T2) of high school—as sketched in the tables of data that follow—over their family's economic situation, school achievement and effort, educational and occupational aspirations, language proficiency and preference, ethnic self-identities, perceptions of discrimination, and global self-esteem and depressive symptoms. These findings are summarized below.

Family Socioeconomic Status and Neighborhood Contexts

The modest family origins of many of these children, the highly educated backgrounds of others, and the gradual improvement of their economic situation over time are described in Table 9-2. Only a tiny proportion of Mexican and Indochinese fathers and mothers (with the signal exception of the U.S.-born Vietnamese, who as noted are the children of the first wave of 1975 refugees) have college degrees, well below the 1990 U.S. norm of 20

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

TABLE 9-2 Family Socioeconomic Status and Neighborhood Characteristics of Children of Immigrants in San Diego, California, by Nativity of the Children and National Origin of Their Parents, in 1992 (T1) and 1995 (T2)

Characteristics by National Origin and Nativitya

 

Mexico

 

Time

FBa

US

Socioeconomic Status

 

 

 

Father

 

 

 

% College graduate

T1

7.1

6.5

% Less than high school

T1

76.3

59.9

% In the labor force

T1

79.9

81.4

% In the labor force

T2

74.1

78.2

Mother

 

 

 

% College graduate

T1

2.7

4.5

% Less than high school

T1

82.6

66.9

% In the labor force

T1

58.0

55.4

% In the labor force

T2

63.4

66.1

Home

 

 

 

% Family owns home

T1

18.3

44.1

% Family owns home

T2

27.5

52.8

% Moved to new home

T2

52.7

32.0

Family's Economic Situation (since 3 yrs. ago)

 

 

 

% Better

T1

56.5

56.4

% Worse

T1

9.4

9.4

% Better

T2

44.8

42.3

% Worse

T2

14.8

14.8

Neighborhood Profilec

 

 

 

(1990 census tract data)

 

 

 

% Below poverty line

T1

55.5

47.4

% Foreign born

T1

34.0

31.3

% White

T1

39.3

42.7

% Speak English only

T1

48.0

51.3

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

 

Philippines

Vietnam

Cambodiab

 

FB

US

FB

US

FB

Socioeconomic Status

 

 

 

 

 

Father

 

 

 

 

 

% College graduate

37.0

23.5

11.0

36.2

4.5

% Less than high school

16.4

15.1

66.3

31.9

77.3

% In the labor force

86.2

79.8

51.4

89.4

22.7

% In the labor force

81.0

85.9

62.4

93.6

35.2

Mother

 

 

 

 

 

% College graduate

37.9

43.0

5.9

25.5

4.5

% Less than high school

22.5

17.5

71.4

48.9

85.2

% In the labor force

84.2

90.6

36.9

72.3

12.5

% In the labor force

84.9

89.1

43.1

74.5

15.9

Home

 

 

 

 

 

% Family owns home

65.3

86.4

28.6

70.2

11.4

% Family owns home

74.2

88.8

28.6

74.5

8.0

% Moved to new home

37.9

25.4

45.7

25.5

43.7

Family's Economic Situation (since 3 yrs. ago)

 

 

 

 

 

% Better

56.7

46.9

58.4

55.6

45.9

% Worse

5.9

11.7

9.2

11.1

15.3

% Better

49.2

38.6

39.4

19.1

22.1

% Worse

13.5

22.4

14.2

25.5

12.8

Neighborhood Profilec

 

 

 

 

 

(1990 census tract data)

 

 

 

 

 

% Below poverty line

16.9

16.4

35.2

21.1

57.7

% Foreign born

29.4

29.6

28.4

23.4

33.1

% White

46.3

45.9

56.3

66.3

42.7

% Speak English only

61.3

61.0

61.0

70.3

51.1

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

 

 

Laos

 

Characteristics by National Origin and Nativitya

Time

Laob

Hmongb

FB

FB

Socioeconomic Status

 

 

 

Father

 

 

 

% College graduate

T1

11.2

2.0

% Less than high school

T1

65.7

86.0

% In the labor force

T1

32.9

20.0

% In the labor force

T2

40.6

34.0

Mother

 

 

 

% College graduate

T1

4.2

0

% Less than high school

T1

76.2

98.0

% In the labor force

T1

25.2

12.0

% In the labor force

T2

31.5

10.0

Home

 

 

 

% Family owns home

T1

25.2

2.0

% Family owns home

T2

36.6

4.0

% Moved to new home

T2

44.4

50.0

Family's Economic Situation (since 3 yrs. ago):

 

 

 

% Better

T1

56.6

54.0

% Worse

T1

7.0

2.0

% Better

T2

38.7

30.6

% Worse

T2

14.1

12.2

Neighborhood Profile:c (1990 census tract data)

 

 

 

% Below poverty line

T1

51.2

44.4

% Foreign born

T1

34.0

34.7

% White

T1

34.3

50.2

% Speak English only

T1

48.8

51.5

a FB = foreign-born children; US = U.S.-born children.

b No separate columns for U.S.-born youths from Cambodia and Laos are included because there were only a handful of such cases in the sample.

c Social and economic characteristics of the neighborhood (census tract) where respondent lived at the time of the T1 (1992) survey; data are drawn from the 1990 census.

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

Characteristics by National Origin and Nativitya

All Others

Total

FB

US

FB

US

Total

Socioeconomic Status

 

 

 

 

 

Father

 

 

 

 

 

% College graduate

35.2

39.8

18.1

19.3

18.7

% Less than high school

31.8

12.2

53.7

33.6

44.8

% In the labor force

76.1

83.7

62.3

81.1

70.6

% In the labor force

79.5

91.8

74.5

83.8

73.0

Mother

 

 

 

 

 

% College graduate

25.0

24.5

14.7

24.9

19.2

% Less than high school

35.2

18.4

60.5

38.8

50.9

% In the labor force

64.8

76.3

51.5

74.0

61.5

% In the labor force

68.2

85.7

55.0

79.0

65.6

Home

 

 

 

 

 

% Family owns home

44.3

80.6

34.8

68.0

49.5

% Family owns home

54.0

81.6

41.1

72.7

55.1

% Moved to new home

47.7

20.4

44.9

27.8

37.3

Family's Economic Situation (since 3 yrs. ago)

 

 

 

 

 

% Better

52.3

56.1

55.8

52.1

54.1

% Worse

11.6

14.3

8.4

11.0

9.6

% Better

45.5

30.6

41.8

38.2

40.2

% Worse

19.3

15.3

14.3

18.8

16.3

Neighborhood Profile:c (1990 census tract data)

 

 

 

 

 

% Below poverty line

29.8

22.8

37.7

29.6

34.0

% Foreign born

21.1

21.8

30.5

29.1

29.9

% White

65.7

67.7

47.1

48.1

47.5

% Speak English only

70.3

71.4

56.7

58.8

57.6

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

percent for adults ages 25 and over. By contrast, 43 percent of Filipino mothers have college degrees, well above national norms. The contrast is made even sharper by looking at the proportion of parents with less than a high school education—that is, less than what their children have already achieved: most of the more recently arrived foreign-born children from Mexico, Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia have fathers and mothers who never completed secondary-level schooling. Mexican fathers and mothers, however, have high rates of labor force participation (both above national norms), whereas the Indochinese refugees have very low rates, indicative of their eligibility for and use of public assistance (again with the notable exception of the U.S.-born children of the 1975 Vietnamese).

Home ownership is a telling indicator of socioeconomic advancement and spatial stability. About half of the total sample lived in families who owned their own homes in 1992 (T1); three years later (T2) that proportion had edged up to 55 percent. But there is a huge gap between groups by nativity and nationality (see Figure 9-1). At T1 only a third of foreign-born children (in more recently immigrated families) lived in homes owned by their parents, compared to two-thirds of native-born children (in longer-resident families, by definition); by T2 the respective figures were 41 versus 73 percent. By nationality the socioeconomic gap is far wider, ranging at T2 from a low of 4 percent among Hmong families from Laos and 8 percent among the Cambodians to 89 percent among native-born Filipinos. On the other hand, one indicator of life change that was appraised positively by most of the youth was moving to a new home: 45 percent of the foreign-born children had moved to another home after T1, compared to 28 percent of the native-born children.

These homes are located in neighborhoods that range from the poorest in San Diego (particularly for Mexican, Cambodian, and Laotian immigrant families) to upper-middle-class suburbs, as suggested by the 1990 census tract data in Table 9-2. Still, for the sample as a whole at T1, their neighborhoods were located in census tracts with a poverty rate of 34 percent on average, much higher than the 1990 rates for the city of San Diego (13.4 percent)

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

FIGURE 9-1 Home ownership, at T1 and T2, San Diego children of immigrants sample, by (top) nativity and (bottom) national origin (percentage).

and the United States (13.1 percent). They are also located in areas with above-average proportions of immigrants (30 percent are foreign born, versus 20 percent for the city overall) and with be-low-average proportions of white residents who speak English only.

The children, nonetheless, are quite optimistic about their families' economic progress. Asked in 1992 whether they believed their family's economic situation was better (or much better), the same, or worse (or much worse) than it had been three years before, 54 percent said it was better, compared to 10 percent who felt it had worsened. Asked the same question in 1995-1996, 40 percent believed it had improved, while 16 percent said it had worsened. Perceptions of downward mobility are significantly associated with depressive symptoms, as will be seen in a later section on psychological well-being outcomes.

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

Family Structure And The Quality Of Family Relationships

Family and school are the central interpersonal contexts shaping the experiences of youth as they make their passages into adulthood. Table 9-3 presents data on the size and composition of family households and on a variety of indicators of the quality of parent-child relationships. At both T1 and T2, family structure emerged as a key determinant of educational performance out-comes—as well as of self-esteem and depressive symptoms. The presence of both natural parents at home is significantly and strongly associated with positive outcomes over time. Indeed, a vivid illustration of the effects of an intact family is the fact that it was a principal predictor of the probability that a student was reinterviewed at T2: while the overall reinterview rate was a solid 85.2 percent, the reinterview rate for students living in intact families at T1 was over 90 percent, compared to 75 percent for students living in stepfamilies or single-parent homes at T1.

Over time in the United States, for every nationality the size of their households decreases (as the economic need to pool resources with extended family members lessens). But there is also evidence, as Table 9-3 shows, that the proportion of intact families with both natural parents at home also decreases slightly, mainly as a result of marital separation or divorce. The sharpest declines were seen among the Hmong and the Cambodians (in the latter case involving a greater number of deaths of parents between T1 and T2 than for any other group). In general, the higher the socioeconomic status of these groups, the larger the proportion of intact families. The highest proportions (around 85 percent) of such stable family structures were noted among U.S.-born Vietnamese and Filipino children and the lowest (around 60 percent) for Mexican families, a figure matched in T2 by the Hmong and the Cambodians.

In addition to the importance of family structure is the question of the quality of familial relationships—that is, of the cohesiveness of families and of the degree of parent-child conflict—and of their effects, net of structural factors. Nearly three-fourths of the youth in the San Diego sample lived in intact families (74 percent at T1, 72 percent at T2), but within these families there is significant variance in the level of cohesiveness and conflict

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

among family members. Indeed, growing up in immigrant families is often marked by wide linguistic and other acculturative gaps between parents and children that can exacerbate intergenerational conflicts, cause the children to feel embarrassed rather than proud of their parents as they try to fit in with native peers, and even lead to role reversals, as children assume adult roles prematurely by dint of circumstance. An indication of the importance of such relationships was suggested in an earlier multivariate analysis of cross-sectional results at T1 (Rumbaut, 1994a), which found that our measure of parent-child conflict emerged as the single strongest determinant—much more so than an intact family structure—of both self-esteem and depression. The same parent-child conflict index had a more significant and stronger (negative) effect on educational achievement (grade point average (GPA)) and aspirations than the weaker (positive) effect of an intact family structure (Rumbaut, 1997a). We will return to those analyses below.

Table 9-3 presents data on family cohesion (a three-item measure used at T2, scaled 1 to 5, as detailed in Appendix 9A); familism (a three-item scale, identified through factor analysis and used at T1 and T2, measuring a deeply ingrained sense of collective obligation to the family); parent-child conflict (a three-item scale also identified through factor analysis and used at T1 and T2); and the proportion of children who indicated embarrassment about their parents at both T1 and T2. The families of Mexico-born youth were the most cohesive and familistic and were characterized by relatively low and actually decreasing parent-child conflict over time, while those of U.S.-born Mexican youth have average scores in cohesion and conflict. Mexican-origin children, regardless of nativity, were significantly less likely to report embarrassment about their parents than any other nationality in the sample. By contrast, levels of parent-child conflict were otherwise significantly higher among foreign-born children than U.S.-born children generally, and by nationality such conflict was highest for the Filipino and Indochinese groups. The Hmong youth, who experience the greatest contextual dissonance between the world of their parents (the majority of whom are preliterate highlanders, with the Hmong language being but an oral tradition until missionaries in Laos developed a written notation for it in the

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

TABLE 9-3 Family Structure and Quality of Family Relationships of Children of Immigrants in San Diego, California, by Nativity of the Children and National Origin of Their Parents, in 1992 (T1) and 1995 (T2)

Characteristics by National Origin and Nativitya

 

Mexico

 

Time

FBa

US

Family-Household

 

 

 

Family-household size

T1

5.1

4.5

 

T2

4.5

4.1

% Intact family (both natural parents at home)

T1

62.1

65.5

 

T2

58.0

60.7

% Stepfamily

T1

14.7

10.7

 

T2

12.5

9.6

% Single parent, other

T1

23.2

23.7

 

T2

29.5

29.7

% Grandparents at home

T1

6.7

8.5

 

T2

3.6

6.8

% Uncles/aunts at home

T1

11.2

8.2

 

T2

4.9

5.4

Family Relationshipsb

 

 

 

Family cohesion (1-5)

T2

3.92

3.58

Familism scale (1-4)

T1

2.21

1.97

 

T2

2.01

1.82

Parent-child conflict (1-4)

T1

1.67

1.69

 

T2

1.57

1.66

% Embarrassed by parent

T1

6.7

8.2

 

T2

10.3

6.2

1950s) and the Southern California megalopolitan world in which they are growing up, seemed caught in a quandary: they were the most apt to express embarrassment about and conflict with their parents at both T1 and T2, despite exhibiting high cohesion and familism scores at the same time. Familism scores were generally higher for foreign-born children than U.S.-born children in this sample and tended to decline over time in the United States, suggesting a growing acculturation to the individualistic values of American society.

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

Characteristics by National Origin and Nativitya

Philippines

Vietnam

Cambodiab

FB

US

FB

US

FB

Family-Household

 

 

 

 

 

Family-household size

4.8

4.3

5.4

5.0

5.5

 

4.4

3.9

5.1

4.6

4.9

% Intact family (both natural parents at home)

75.9

85.4

74.9

87.2

70.5

 

73.3

84.4

74.5

85.1

62.5

% Stepfamily

12.2

5.4

5.1

2.1

5.7

 

11.6

4.0

5.1

2.1

3.4

% Single parent, other

11.9

9.1

20.0

10.6

23.9

 

15.1

11.6

20.4

12.8

34.1

% Grandparents at home

27.3

22.7

14.5

6.4

13.6

 

22.8

15.1

14.1

6.4

10.2

% Uncles/aunts at home

15.4

10.6

16.1

23.4

12.5

 

11.9

7.7

14.5

12.8

13.6

Family Relationshipsb

 

 

 

 

 

Family cohesion (1-5)

3.61

3.50

3.43

3.24

3.45

Familism scale (1-4)

1.88

1.84

2.17

1.80

2.11

 

1.86

1.78

2.17

2.01

2.01

Parent-child conflict (1-4)

1.78

1.72

1.84

1.78

1.94

 

1.86

1.74

1.86

1.88

1.96

% Embarrassed by parent

20.6

16.5

22.4

42.6

33.0

 

16.7

17.0

19.2

12.8

22.7

Patterns of Achievement: School Performance, Schoolwork, and School Contexts

An important reason for following this sample of students over time was to find out about their educational performance, their likelihood of dropping out of school before graduation, and the main determinants of these outcomes. One key question was whether the level of attainment exhibited by these children of immigrants matched, exceeded, or fell below the average for grades 9 through 12 for the San Diego school district overall (the nation's eighth largest). A fairly precise comparison of official GPAs and

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

 

 

Laos

 

Characteristics by National Origin and Nativitya

 

Laob

Hmongb

Time

FB

FB

Family-Household

 

 

 

Family-household size

T1

5.6

6.9

 

T2

5.2

5.6

% Intact family (both natural parents at home)

T1

75.5

76.0

 

T2

78.3

60.0

% Stepfamily

T1

5.6

4.0

 

T2

6.3

4.0

% Single parent, other

T1

18.9

20.0

 

T2

15.4

36.0

% Grandparents at home

T1

20.3

12.0

 

T2

18.2

4.0

% Uncles/aunts at home

T1

10.5

8.0

 

T2

9.1

2.0

Family Relationshipsb

 

 

 

Family cohesion (1-5)

T2

3.55

3.79

Familism scale (1-4)

T1

2.17

2.16

 

T2

2.22

2.13

Parent-child conflict (1-4)

T1

1.78

1.97

 

T2

1.85

2.10

% Embarrassed by parent

T1

19.6

34.0

 

T2

16.8

34.0

a FB = foreign-born children; US = U.S.-born children.

b See Appendix 9A for the composition and reliability of these scales. Family cohesion was measured by a three-item scale scored from 1 (never) to 5 (always). The three-item familism

dropout rates is possible, since the school system is the same source of information for both measures and both populations. Academic GPAs (the percentage of students with GPAs below 2.0 and above 3.0), broken down by grade level (9 through 12), for all schools districtwide in San Diego in 1993-1994, were compared against the GPAs earned in grades 9 through 12 in those schools by the entire original sample of 2,420 children of immigrants during 1992-1995. The results showed that at every grade level the children of immigrants outperformed the district norms, although

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

Characteristics by National Origin and Nativitya

All Others

Total

FB

US

FB

US

Total

Family-Household

 

 

 

 

 

Family-household size

3.8

3.3

5.2

4.3

4.8

 

3.4

3.1

4.7

3.9

4.4

% Intact family (both natural parents at home)

61.4

71.4

71.3

76.4

73.5

 

64.8

73.5

69.3

73.9

71.3

% Stepfamily

11.4

12.2

9.5

8.0

8.8

 

8.0

9.2

8.4

6.8

7.7

% Single parent, other

27.3

16.3

19.3

15.6

17.6

 

27.3

17.3

22.4

19.3

21.0

% Grandparents at home

14.8

11.2

17.1

15.0

16.1

 

10.2

8.2

13.9

10.6

12.5

% Uncles/aunts at home

9.1

4.1

13.1

9.7

11.6

 

1.1

3.1

9.8

6.4

8.3

Family Relationshipsb

 

 

 

 

 

Family cohesion (1-5)

3.71

3.48

3.63

3.51

3.58

Familism scale (1-4)

2.04

1.65

2.08

1.87

1.99

 

1.96

1.63

2.04

1.80

1.93

Parent-child conflict (1-4)

1.70

1.59

1.78

1.70

1.75

 

1.73

1.57

1.81

1.70

1.76

% Embarrassed by parent

26.1

26.5

20.2

15.6

18.2

 

20.5

15.3

17.2

12.8

15.3

scale is scored 1 (disagree a lot) to 4 (agree a lot). The parent-child conflict scale also consists of three items, scored 1 (not true at all) to 4 (very true). The data reported in the table are mean scores for these three scales.

the gap narrowed over time and grade level. For example, only 29 percent of all ninth graders in the district had GPAs above 3.0 (top students with A's and B's in their academic classes), compared to a much higher 44 percent of the ninth graders from immigrant families; and while 36 percent of ninth graders districtwide had low GPAs under 2.0 (less than a C on average), only half as many (18 percent) of the children of immigrants performed as poorly. Those differentials declined over time by grade

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

level, so that the advantage by the twelfth grade is reduced to a few percentage points in favor of the children of immigrants.

The GPA gap narrows at least in part because a greater proportion of students districtwide drop out of school than do youth from immigrant families. The multiyear dropout rate for students in grades 9 through 12 in the San Diego schools in 1994 was 16.2 percent, nearly triple the rate of 5.7 percent for the entire original sample of children of immigrants—that is, of the 2,420 students who were originally interviewed in 1992 in the eighth and ninth grades, only 5.7 percent were officially determined to have dropped out of school at any point by 1996. That dropout rate is significantly lower than the dropout rates for preponderantly native non-Hispanic white (10.5 percent) and black (17.8 percent) high school students. Among students from immigrant families, the highest dropout rate (8.5 percent) was for Hispanic (mostly Mexican-origin) students, but even that rate was noticeably lower than the district norm and lower than the rate for non-Hispanic whites.

Table 9-4 describes the school performance of these youth over time and provides data on the level of effort they invested (comparing daily hours spent doing homework versus watching television) and on a range of characteristics of their school contexts. In terms of national origin there are major differences seen in all indicators of school performance. The highest GPAs were earned by Vietnamese and especially the ''other Asian" (Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Indian) students, although the Vietnamese have average dropout rates relative to other nationalities in the sample as well as an above-average number of school suspensions (mostly for fighting and disruption/defiance). The lowest dropout rates were evidenced by the Lao and the Hmong—the two ethnic groups from Laos—while the Cambodians had the lowest number of school suspensions. Filipinos performed above average on all outcome measures. The Mexicans, on the other hand, evidenced significantly lower GPAs and higher rates of dropping out and of being suspended from school than any other group in the sample—although it bears recalling the above-mentioned finding that they still showed a lower multiyear dropout rate than that for the district as a whole and for mostly native non-Hispanic white and black students in the school system.

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

These results are remarkable enough in view of the relatively low socioeconomic status of a substantial proportion of the immigrant families. They become all the more remarkable in the context of other school data displayed in Table 9-4. At T1 over a quarter (28.7 percent) of the students were classified as LEP (limited English proficient) by their schools, ranging from virtually none of the native-born Filipinos to around two-thirds of the foreign-born Mexican, Cambodian, and Hmong students. That classification is supported by nationally standardized ASAT (Abbreviated Stanford Achievement Test) scores measuring English reading skills: the sample as a whole scored just below the fortieth percentile nationally, and the foreign-born groups with the highest proportion of LEP students scored in the bottom quartile nationally. That language handicap reflects their relatively recent arrival as nonnative English speakers; a language other than English is spoken in the homes of nearly all of these students (96 percent at T2), although, as will be shown below, their fluency in the parental language tends to atrophy over time, while their ability in and preference for English increase. On the other hand, as would be expected, all groups do better in math computation than English reading tests (for an earlier districtwide study, see Rumbaut and Ima, 1988). At T1 their ASAT math achievement test scores placed the sample as a whole at the fiftieth percentile nationally, with some students achieving extraordinarily high scores, notably the U.S.-born Vietnamese and "other Asian" students, placing most of them in the top quartile nationally. In fact, a disproportionate number of U.S.-born students were classified as gifted by the schools, as shown in Table 9-4.

One key reason for these students' above-average GPAs, despite significant socioeconomic and linguistic handicaps, is shown in the middle panel of Table 9-4. They work for it. At both T1 and T2 these students reported spending an average of over two hours per day on homework, with the foreign-born students compensating for language and other handicaps by significantly outworking their U.S.-born peers. From the end of junior high at T1 to the end of senior high at T2, the level of effort put into schoolwork increased across all nationalities. The sole exception in this regard were the Hmong, who at T1 posted the highest average number of daily homework hours (2.9) but decreased to 2.6 hours at

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

TABLE 9-4 School Performance, Schoolwork, and School Contexts of Children of Immigrants in San Diego, California, by Nativity of the Children and National Origin of Their Parents, in 1992 (T1) and 1995 (T2)

Characteristics by National Origin and Nativitya

 

Mexico

 

Time

FBa

US

School Performance

 

 

 

Academic GPAb

T1

2.37

2.25

 

T2

2.32

2.31

Reading: national percentilec

T1

22.3

29.0

Math: national percentiled

T1

28.5

33.5

% Classified as LEPe

T1

62.5

26.8

% Classified as giftedf

T1

4.9

6.5

% Dropped out since T1g

T2

5.4

6.5

% Suspended since T1h

T2

22.8

24.3

Homework and TV

 

 

 

Homework hours daily

T1

1.73

1.66

 

T2

2.05

1.88

TV-watching hours daily

T1

2.80

3.02

 

T2

2.20

2.39

School Contexts

 

 

 

School Safety (% agree)

T2

 

 

% Many gangs in school

 

36.9

38.7

% Frequent ethnic fights

 

44.1

44.3

% Disruptions by others

 

45.9

45.7

% Don't feel safe there

 

24.9

26.3

School Events (this year)

T2

 

 

% Had property stolen

 

36.8

37.4

% Was offered drugs

 

20.3

33.4

% Was threatened

 

18.1

13.4

% Got in physical fight

 

20.3

16.1

School Teaching (agree)

T2

 

 

% Teaching is good

 

90.1

85.5

% Teachers are interested

 

86.4

80.7

% Grading is fair

 

74.4

72.8

% Discipline is fair

 

76.8

73.2

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

Characteristics by National Origin and Nativitya

Philippines

Vietnam

 

Cambodiab

FB

US

FB

US

FB

School Performance

 

 

 

 

 

Academic GPAb

3.02

2.98

3.05

3.21

2.75

 

2.86

2.95

3.05

3.14

2.58

Reading: national percentilec

50.2

54.0

33.3

63.4

14.0

Math: national percentiled

57.9

62.3

57.4

70.6

35.8

% Classified as LEPe

13.8

0.5

45.1

4.3

70.1

% Classified as giftedf

19.3

24.4

11.8

38.3

1.1

% Dropped out since T1g

2.3

2.7

3.1

2,1

3.4

% Suspended since T1h

11.9

12.1

21.2

10.6

17.0

Homework and TV

 

 

 

 

 

Homework hours daily

2.57

2.33

2.55

2.58

2.27

 

2.79

2.61

2.89

2.89

2.44

TV-watching hours daily

3.21

3.09

2.64

2.41

2.72

 

2.51

2.37

2.18

2.20

2.26

School Contexts

 

 

 

 

 

School Safety (% agree)

 

 

 

 

 

% Many gangs in school

56.6

53.1

51.0

46.8

60.2

% Frequent ethnic fights

46.6

44.0

54.9

66.0

67.0

% Disruptions by others

55.3

54.3

58.8

46.8

54.0

% Don't feel safe there

23.8

22.5

21.7

25.5

25.0

School events (this year)

 

 

 

 

 

% Had property stolen

48.2

41.7

45.1

55.3

42.0

% Was offered drugs

24.4

31.3

13.3

36.2

10.2

% Was threatened

21.6

17.6

16.1

23.4

21.6

% Got in physical fight

15.8

9.7

17.6

10.9

17.0

School Teaching (agree)

 

 

 

 

 

% Teaching is good

85.9

88.6

85.4

85.1

86.4

% Teachers are interested

83.0

82.5

77.4

78.7

85.2

% Grading is fair

74.9

72.5

70.6

66.0

71.6

% Discipline is fair

78.1

73.3

72.3

74.5

70.1

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

 

 

Laos

Characteristics by National Origin and Nativitya

Time

Laoa

Hmongb

FB

FB

School Performance

 

 

 

Academic GPAb

T1

2.89

2.92

 

T2

2.89

2.63

Reading: national percentilec

T1

22.6

15.8

Math: national percentiled

T1

42.6

30.6

% Classified as LEPe

T1

49.0

66.0

% Classified as giftedf

T1

5.6

0.0

% Dropped out since T1g

T2

2.8

4.0

% Suspended since T1h

T2

13.3

18.0

Homework and TV

 

 

 

Homework hours daily

T1

2.36

2.86

 

T2

2.47

2.58

TV-watching hours daily

T1

2.63

2.40

 

T2

2.25

1.96

School Contexts

 

 

 

School Safety (% agree)

T2

 

 

% Many gangs in school

 

62.7

77.6

% Frequent ethnic fights

 

72.1

77.5

% Disruptions by others

 

64.1

67.3

% Don't feel safe there

 

30.8

46.9

School Events (this year)

T2

 

 

% Had property stolen

 

49.0

38.0

% Was offered drugs

 

16.8

10.0

% Was threatened

 

19.6

22.0

% Got in physical fight

 

21.8

12.0

School Teaching (agree)

T2

 

 

% Teaching is good

 

92.3

87.8

% Teachers are interested

 

81.7

64.6

% Grading is fair

 

76.9

65.3

% Discipline is fair

 

75.9

72.9

a FB = foreign-born children; US = U.S.-born children.

b Cumulative academic grade point average (A = 4, B = 3, C = 2, D = 1, F = 0), weighted for advanced placement and honors courses (for which A = 5, B = 4, C = 3).

c National percentile rank based on the English reading vocabulary and comprehension subtest of the Abbreviated Stanford Achievement Test (ASAT).

d National percentile rank based on the mathematics subtest of the ASAT.

e LEP: limited English proficient student, as officially classified by the school system, based partly on standardized English proficiency tests.

f Gifted: official school classification, based on standardized tests and other evaluations.

g A dropout, as officially defined by the California State Department of Education, is any student in grades 7 through 12 who left school before graduation or attainment of its legal equivalent (e.g., GED) and did not return to school or another educational program by mid-October of the

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

Characteristics by National Origin and Nativitya

All Others

Total

 

 

FB

US

FB

US

Total

School Performance

 

 

 

 

 

Academic GPAb

3.06

3.11

2.87

2.72

2.80 

 

3.16

3.24

2.80

2.73

2.77

Reading: national percentilec

44.2

69.9

33.4

46.3

39.5

Math: national percentiled

56.9

69.2

47.5

51.9

49.6

% Classified as LEPe

34.1

1.0

42.5

11.4

28.7

% Classified as giftedf

21.6

45.9

11.2

20.2

15.2

% Dropped out since T1g

3.4

2.0

3.4

4.0

3.7

% Suspended since T1h

18.2

12.2

17.2

16.9

17.1

Homework and TV

 

 

 

 

 

Homework hours daily

2.33

2.32

2.36

2.08

2.23

 

2.85

2.65

2.61

2.34

2.49

TV-watching hours daily

2.53

2.60

2.81

2.98

2.88

 

2.39

1.80

2.29

2.31

2.30

School Contexts

 

 

 

 

 

School Safety (% agree)

 

 

 

 

 

% Many gangs in school

36.0

41.2

51.9

46.0

49.3

% Frequent ethnic fights

45.9

36.1

53.8

44.8

49.8

% Disruptions by others

57.5

43.3

55.8

49.7

53.1

% Don't feel safe there

26.7

18.6

25.5

24.0

24.8

School Events (this year)

 

 

 

 

 

% Had property stolen

50.6

35.1

44.5

40.3

42.6

% Was offered drugs

21.8

28.9

18.3

32.1

24.4

% Was threatened

14.9

16.5

18.9

16.3

17.7

% Got in physical fight

11.6

10.3

17.2

12.7

15.2

School Teaching (agree)

 

 

 

 

 

% Teaching is good

83.9

80.4

87.4

86.3

86.9

% Teachers are interested

79.1

79.4

81.7

80.8

81.3

% Grading is fair

79.1

74.2

73.9

72.3

73.2

% Discipline is fair

75.9

74.2

75.5

73.2

74.5

following year, as evidenced by a transcript request or other reliable documentation. The rates indicated are the percentage of students who dropped out at any time between spring 1992 and spring 1996.

h Percentage suspended from school for any reason at least once between 1991 and 1995. Suspending a student from school for one or more days is, except for expulsion, the most severe official reaction to student disciplinary infractions. Most (nearly 80%) of the suspensions in the San Diego school district are meted out for physical injury (fights, threats, attempts) and disruption/defiance; others include property damage, tobacco/alcohol/drugs, and weapons infractions. Suspensions rise sharply in grade 7, peaking in grade 8, and dropping steadily until grade 12, and male students are suspended far more often than females (districtwide the male-to-female suspension ratio was 3:1 in 1993-1994, a 10-year low). The average suspension in grades 9 through 12 is approximately 2.5 days.

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

T2 (still above the sample average); not surprisingly, that drop in effort was matched by a drop in their GPAs from 2.92 at T1 to 2.63 at T2, the main drop in GPA among all groups in the sample. GPA, more so than achievement test scores, is a measure of school performance that reflects the level of effort made by the student and rewarded by the teacher. Overall, the children of immigrants generally maintained their level of GPA attainment from T1 (2.80) to T2 (2.77).

In multivariate analyses at T1 the number of daily homework hours emerged as the strongest single predictor of higher GPAs, while the number of hours spent watching television daily was significantly associated with lower GPAs (see Rumbaut, 1995, 1997b). By T2 the data show that students who had dedicated more hours to schoolwork in junior high did significantly better in terms of educational achievement three years later. Conversely, students who spent a large number of hours in front of the television by age 14 were more prone to perform poorly in subsequent years. The negative effect of television on children's academic performance is confirmed by these findings—although the effect, while still significantly negative, becomes weaker. Table 9-4 shows that for all groups without exception the average amount of time spent watching television declined from the early to midadolescent years at T1 to the end of high school and adolescence at T2, as the students matured and got drivers' licenses and part-time jobs. Still, taken together, these results suggest that, even among students from low socioeconomic backgrounds, those with ambition and work discipline were more prone to get ahead educationally.

What other factors were found to be most predictive of children of immigrants' educational achievement and aspirations? A preliminary multivariate analysis (not shown for reasons of space) suggests that falling behind or getting ahead in school is largely determined by the same set of factors. Children who come from intact families with both natural parents present at home do much better—that is, they have higher GPAs, lower dropout rates and suspensions, and higher aspirations. This is even more pronounced in families (even intact families) with lower levels of conflict in parent-child interactions. The greater the stability of the family, both structurally and emotionally, the greater the educa-

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

tional achievement and aspirations—and, in addition, the higher the self-esteem and the lower the level of depressive symptoms. Overall, low-conflict intact families exhibit the best outcomes across the board, while high-conflict nonintact families fare the worst in high dropout and school suspension rates, although high-conflict families regardless of type of parental structure yield equally poor GPAs, self-esteem, and depression scores. The quality of familial relationships, even more than family structure, has very significant effects on school performance.

Similarly, youth who come from high-status families also have a distinct advantage. Those whose mothers and fathers have a college education perform much better in terms of achieving high GPAs and remaining in school without disciplinary action taken against them, than do those whose parents have lesser levels of education. These same patterns are evident for other indicators of socioeconomic status, such as home ownership and neighborhood poverty rates. Students who stay in school and earn higher grades with fewer suspensions tend to attend suburban schools in higher-status areas. It is scarcely surprising that more cohesive and resourceful home and school environments lead to higher educational achievement. In this respect, children of immigrants are no different than native-born children.

While gender makes only a slight difference in terms of remaining in school, it strongly affects grades and suspensions, with females exhibiting superior performance compared to male students as well as an edge in educational aspirations. For both males and females, however, hard work and a clear sense of future goals pay off handsomely. High occupational goals in early adolescence (which are detailed in the next section) are closely associated with remaining in school and with better educational performance. So is the influence of peers: the worst educational outcomes, by far, were associated with having close friends who themselves had dropped out of school or had no plans for college; conversely, the best outcomes were attained by students whose circle of friends largely consisted of college-bound peers.

The bottom panel in Table 9-4 now shifts the focus to specific events and circumstances in the school attended by the respondent. The items listed were factor analyzed and found to make up three factors (which were subsequently combined to produce

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

three indices): (1) an index of perceived school safety—including the presence of gangs at school, the frequency of interracial or interethnic fights, appraisals of the level of disruptions by others experienced at school, and whether the respondent felt safe at school; (2) an index of stressful school events occurring to the respondent in the current year—including one or more instances of getting into a physical fight, being threatened, being offered drugs, or having personal property stolen while at school; and (3) a measure of teaching quality and fairness—appraisals of whether the teachers are interested and the teaching is good and of the fairness of grading and discipline. Despite very high reports of disruptions, gang presence and interethnic fights at school (about 50 percent reported these), not feeling safe at school (25 percent did not feel safe), and a high incidence of stressful events (from thefts to threats), almost nine-tenths (87 percent) gave high marks to their teachers, in part another way of underscoring the value they place on education. As will be detailed below, it turns out that these indices of contextual factors had significant effects in multivariate analyses of self-esteem and depressive symptoms at T2.

Patterns of Ambition: Educational and Occupational Aspirations and Values

Children of immigrants are ambitious and their goals—both their aspirations and their expectations— remain stable over time, as evidenced by the results shown in Table 9-5. At both T1 and T2 an identical 61 percent aspired to an advanced degree. Asked for a realistic assessment of their chances of fulfilling their aspirations, at T1, 35 percent "realistically" expected to obtain advanced degrees and another 39 percent would not be satisfied with less than a college degree. At T2, as the high school years came to a close, these proportions edged up slightly—37 percent now "realistically" expected to earn advanced degrees and another 41 percent expected to graduate from college—showing the resilience over time of these aspirations. The proportion of those who, based on a realistic assessment, believed that they would not reach as far as a college degree dropped from 26 percent at T1 to 22 percent at T2. Given the modest family origins and material resources of

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

many of these children, their ambitions and even realistic expectations may be quite disproportionate with what many will be able to achieve in the end. In part, their optimism may be triggered by their appraisal of the economic progress of their families (as seen above in Table 9-2) and by their own efforts so far (as suggested by the results presented in Table 9-4).

Ambition matters. The research literature shows that high expectations are necessary for subsequent achievement. However, there are significant variations both among immigrant communities and in the social context that would make attainment of their expectations possible. While most of these youth aim high, the loftiest goals are found among the Filipinos, Vietnamese (most notably the children of the 1975 refugees), and "other Asians," with about half of them (whether foreign born or native born) believing that they would achieve a postgraduate degree—percentages that increased over time. The least ambitious expectations are seen among the Mexicans, Cambodians, and Laotians—who are also the groups whose expectations decreased over time. Thus, there are major differences in aspirations by family socioeconomic status, and this gap appears to widen over time. Children from better-off families have predictably higher and more secure plans for the future. The correlations between parental socioeconomic status variables and children's educational goals and expectations are positive and highly significant.

Indeed, even more ambitious than these children are their own parents. As Table 9-5 clearly shows, asked what their parents' expectations were for their educational futures, the students felt that their parents expected them to achieve at a much higher level than the students themselves aspired to. Indeed, for many immigrants that is precisely the purpose of bringing their children to the United States. For example, at T2, while 37 percent of the students expected to attain an advanced degree, 60 percent of their parents did so; and while 22 percent of the children expected to stop short of a college degree, only 9 percent of the parents held such a low expectation. Parental expectations are significantly correlated with students' school performance.

In sharp contrast to perceived parental pressures to achieve are the plans of the students' close friends—and here again the types of peer groups the students are embedded in vary in part

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

TABLE 9-5 Educational and Occupational Aspirations and Expectations of Children of Immigrants and of Their Parents and Peers by Nativity of the Children and National Origin of Their Parents, in 1992 (T1) and 1995 (T2)

Characteristics by National Origin and Nativitya

Time

Mexico

FBa

US

Educational Aspirations

 

 

 

% Advanced degree

T1

53.8

48.4

 

T2

48.7

47.5

% College degree

T1

22.0

28.9

 

T2

26.3

31.6

% Less than college

T1

24.2

22.7

 

T2

25.0

20.9

Educational Expectationsb

 

 

 

% Advanced degree

T1

33.0

28.0

 

T2

25.9

23.2

% College degree

T1

30.4

35.6

 

T2

31.3

44.4

% Less than college

T1

36.6

36.4

 

T2

42.9

32.5

Parents' Aspirationsc

 

 

 

% Advanced degree

T2

57.1

47.2

% College degree

T2

27.2

36.7

% Less than college

T2

15.6

16.1

Occupational Aspirations

 

 

 

% Upper-level white-collar job

T1

61.2

63.6

 

T2

66.1

59.6

Plans of Most Friendsd

 

 

 

% Dropped out of school

T2

6.7

8.3

% No college plans

T2

11.4

11.6

% Get a job after high school

T2

33.5

32.2

% Go to 2-year college

T2

25.9

24.9

% Go to 4-year university

T2

26.2

26.7

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

Characteristics by National Origin and Nativitya

Philippines

Vietnam

Cambodiab

FB

US

FB

US

FB

Educational Aspirations

 

 

 

 

 

% Advanced degree

75.8

71.1

55.2

89.4

54.0

 

72.7

70.7

64.3

87.2

51.1

% College degree

19.4

24.7

32.1

6.4

33.3

 

21.9

22.8

26.3

10.6

34.1

% Less than college

4.8

4.2

12.7

4.3

12.6

 

5.5

6.5

9.4

2.1

14.8

Educational Expectationsb

 

 

 

 

 

% Advanced degree

40.8

40.2

37.3

46.8

23.9

 

46.9

43.2

46.3

51.1

21.6

% College degree

42.4

43.2

39.6

44.7

40.9

 

38.6

43.5

38.4

42.6

47.7

% Less than college

16.7

16.5

23.1

8.5

35.2

 

14.5

13.3

15.3

6.4

30.7

Parents' Aspirationsc

 

 

 

 

 

% Advanced degree

65.3

63.5

62.7

78.7

58.0

% College degree

31.2

32.1

26.7

21.3

33.0

% Less than college

3.5

4.4

10.6

0.0

9.1

Occupational Aspirations

 

 

 

 

 

% Upper-level white-collar job

74.9

80.7

67.8

76.6

69.3

 

82.0

83.7

76.1

80.9

76.1

Plans of Most Friendsd

 

 

 

 

 

% Dropped out of school

1.9

1.7

3.6

0.0

3.4

% No college plans

4.8

4.5

5.5

6.4

11.5

% Get a job after high school

32.2

26.3

15.5

19.1

25.3

% Go to 2-year college

31.4

27.4

18.3

23.4

38.6

% Go to 4-year university

50.5

54.0

47.4

57.4

45.5

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

 

Laos

Characteristics by National Origin and Nativitya

Time

Laob

Hmongb

FB

FB

Educational Aspirations

 

 

 

% Advanced degree

T1

42.9

40.0

 

T2

50.3

54.0

% College degree

T1

32.1

26.0

 

T2

28.7

30.0

% Less than college

T1

25.0

34.0

 

T2

21.0

16.0

Educational Expectationsb

 

 

 

% Advanced degree

T1

20.3

12.0

 

T2

21.7

6.0

% College degree

T1

33.6

30.0

 

T2

47.6

62.0

% Less than college

T1

46.2

58.0

 

T2

30.8

32.0

Parents' Aspirationsc

 

 

 

% Advanced degree

T2

56.6

48.0

% College degree

T2

28.7

36.0

% Less than college

T2

14.7

16.0

Occupational Aspirations

 

 

 

% Upper-level white-collar job

T1

62.9

50.0

 

T2

73.4

58.0

Plans of Most Friendsd

 

 

 

% Dropped out of school

T2

3.5

4.0

% No college plans

T2

6.4

4.0

% Get a job after high school

T2

25.4

16.0

% Go to 2-year college

T2

24.6

30.0

% Go to 4-year university

T2

42.3

36.0

a FB = foreign-born children; US = U.S.-born children.

b Responses to the question, ''And realistically speaking, what is the highest level of education you think you will get?"

c Responses to the question, "What is the highest level of education that your parents want you to get?"

d The question asked "How many of your friends have . . . ?" Data above show the applicable responses pertaining to "many or most friends" of the respondent.

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

Characteristics by National Origin and Nativitya

All Others

 

Total

 

 

FB

US

FB

US

Total

Educational Aspirations

 

 

 

 

 

% Advanced degree

65.9

75.3

59.0

63.6

61.1

 

68.2

72.2

60.7

62.5

61.5

% College degree

28.4

23.7

26.4

25.1

25.8

 

23.9

21.6

25.9

25.7

25.8

% Less than college

5.7

1.0

14.6

11.3

13.1

 

8.0

6.2

13.4

11.8

12.7

Educational Expectationsb

 

 

 

 

 

% Advanced degree

50.0

49.0

34.2

36.6

35.3

 

56.8

61.2

36.8

37.5

37.1

% College degree

35.2

42.9

37.2

40.2

38.5

 

30.7

26.5

39.2

42.1

40.5

% Less than college

14.8

8.2

28.6

23.2

26.2

 

12.5

12.2

24.0

20.4

22.4

Parents' Aspirationsc

 

 

 

 

 

% Advanced degree

64.8

66.3

60.5

58.5

59.6

% College degree

31.8

32.7

29.7

33.1

31.2

% Less than college

3.4

1.0

9.8

8.4

9.2

Occupational Aspirations

 

 

 

 

 

% Upper-level white-collar job

70.5

76.5

67.2

73.4

70.0

 

78.4

76.5

74.8

73.3

74.2

Plans of Most Friendsd

 

 

 

 

 

% Dropped out of school

6.9

3.1

4.0

4.3

4.1

% No college plans

8.0

6.1

7.0

7.7

7.3

% Get a job after high school

16.1

17.5

25.6

27.2

26.3

% Go to 2-year college

20.7

11.3

26.4

24.4

25.5

% Go to 4-year university

51.7

55.1

43.6

43.2

43.4

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

by family socioeconomic status. Children from higher-status families, growing up in neighborhoods where residents have low poverty rates and high levels of education, are also much less likely to have friends who have dropped out of high school, who have no college plans, or who plan to skip college and get a full-time job after high school. Conversely, most of the friends of these advantaged youth also intend to attend four-year colleges or universities. The sharpest contrast in these friendship networks is seen between the U.S.-born Vietnamese (57 percent of whom report that most of their friends plan to attend four-year colleges or universities, while virtually none have friends who dropped out of school) and Mexican students (only a quarter of whom have friends who plan to attend four-year colleges, a third have friends who plan to get a job after high school, and about 8 percent have close friends who had already dropped out of school). These social circles can exercise a powerful influence in either reinforcing or undercutting adolescents' high aspirations and confidence in reaching them.

Table 9-5 also reports results at T1 and T2 of the occupational aspirations of children of immigrants. The proportion aspiring to upper-level white-collar professions increased from 70 percent of the total sample at T1 to 74 percent at T2. Such goals increased for every group, by nativity and nationality, except for U.S.-born youth of Mexican parents, for whom a slight decline was registered (from 64 to 60 percent). For the overall sample the proportion of native-born children of immigrants who reported such aspirations remained identical (73 percent) from junior high to the end of senior high, while such aspirations increased for foreign-born youth from two-thirds of them at T1 to three-fourths at T2. In general, as in the case with educational aspirations, the stability and resilience of these occupational aspirations over time is underscored by these latest data. And as with educational goals, higher-status families encourage loftier occupational goals in their children. By and large, children of immigrants imitate their native peers in preferring careers perceived as the most prestigious and remunerative.

The professions of choice at T1 (not shown in Table 9-5) were physician (22 percent), engineer (14 percent), business executive/ manager (10 percent), lawyer (8 percent), and computer program-

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

mer (7 percent). In the T2 survey three years later the top three choices were again physician (20 percent), engineer (15 percent), and business executive/manager (14 percent), followed now by nurse/physical therapist (13 percent) and professor/teacher (9 percent). By T2 the choice of law as a career fell to ninth place, below clerical/sales (5 percent), while computer programmer remained the choice of 7 percent of the sample. In the most popular career choices there were noticeable differences by nationality at both T1 and T2. By the latest survey, almost a third of the Vietnamese (30 percent) aspired to become physicians—up from 24 percent in 1992—and another 18 percent aspired to business management—up from 12 percent in the first survey. Among the Filipinos, the proportion planning to become doctors declined over this time from 28 to 23 percent, while the choice of a nursing career more than doubled from 9 to 22 percent (the career modeled by many of their mothers). Among the Mexicans and the other Indochinese groups, occupational plans became more realistic, with the proportions planning to become doctors and lawyers declining significantly by T2, while more modest professions increased in popularity. Still, notably, by T2 Mexicans ranked above all other groups in their aspiration to become lawyers.

Finally, as depicted in Figure 9-2, the children of immigrants in this sample almost universally value the importance of a good education. Out of a variety of choices given in the T2 survey, 90 percent ranked a good education as "very important" (more than any other value), and another 81 percent deemed becoming an expert in one's field "very important," while only half as many (45 percent) equally valued ''having lots of money."

Language Shifts: English Proficiency and Preference

Language preference is a key index of cultural assimilation. Over 90 percent of these children of immigrants reported speaking a language other than English at home, mostly with their parents. But as seen in Table 9-6, at T1 two-thirds of the total sample (66 percent) already preferred to speak English instead of their parents' native tongue, including 56 percent of the foreign-born youth and 78 percent of the U.S.-born youth. Three years later the proportion had grown significantly to over four-fifths (82 per-

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

FIGURE 9-2 Values ranked "very important," T2 (1995), San Diego children of immigrants sample (percentage).

cent), including 72 percent of the foreign-born youth and over 90 percent of the U.S.-born youth. The most linguistically assimilated in this respect were the Filipinos, among whom 92 percent of those born in the Philippines (where English is an official language) and 98 percent of those born in the United States preferred English by T2. But even among the most mother-tongue-retentive group—the Mexican-origin youth living in a Spanish-named city on the Mexican border with a large Spanish-speaking immigrant population and a wide range of Spanish-language radio and television stations—the force of linguistic assimilation was incontrovertible: while at T1 only a third (32 percent) of the Mexico-born children preferred English, by T2 that preference had doubled to 61 percent; and while just over half (53 percent) of the U.S.-born youth preferred English at T1, that proportion had jumped to four-fifths (79 percent) three years later (see Figure 9-3).

A main reason for this rapid language shift in use and preference has to do with their increasing fluency in English (both spoken and written) relative to their level of fluency in their mother

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

tongue. Respondents were asked to evaluate their ability to speak, understand, read, and write in both English and the non-English mother tongue; the response format (identical to the item used in the U.S. census) ranged from "not at all" and "not well" to "well" and ''very well." Over two-thirds of the total sample reported speaking English "very well" (67 percent at T1, growing to 71 percent at T2), compared to only about a third who reported an equivalent level of spoken fluency in the non-English language. Naturally, these differentials are much more pronounced among U.S.-born youth, most of whom (87 percent) spoke English "very well," while only a fourth of them could speak their parental language "very well." But even among the foreign born, those who spoke English very well surpassed by 59 to 44 percent those who spoke the foreign language just as well.

The differences in reading fluency (not shown in the table for reasons of space) are much sharper still: those who can read English "very well" triple the proportion of those who can read a non-English language very well (68 to 23 percent). Only the Mexican-born youth maintained by T2 an edge in their reported knowledge of Spanish over English, and even they indicated a preference for English. The ability to maintain a sound level of literacy in a language—particularly in languages with entirely different alphabets and rules of syntax and grammar, such as many of the Asian languages brought by immigrants to California—is nearly impossible in the absence of schools that teach it and a community in which it can be regularly practiced.

As a consequence, the bilingualism of these children of immigrants becomes increasingly uneven and unstable. The data in Table 9-6 and Figure 9-3 vividly underscore the rapidity with which English triumphs and foreign languages atrophy in the United States—even in San Diego, with the busiest international border crossing in the world—as the second generation not only comes to speak, read, and write it fluently but prefers it overwhelmingly to their parents' native tongue.

This linear pattern of rapid linguistic assimilation is constant across nationalities and socioeconomic levels and suggests that, over time, the use of and fluency in foreign languages will inevitably decline—results that directly rebut nativist alarms about the perpetuation of foreign-language enclaves in immigrant commu-

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

TABLE 9-6 Language Preference and Proficiency and Ethnic Self-Identity Among Children of Immigrants in San Diego, California, by Nativity of the Children and National Origin of their Parents, in 1992 (T1) and 1995 (T2)

Characteristics by National Origin and Nativitya

 

Mexico

 

Time

FBa

US

English Language

 

 

 

% Prefers English

T1

32.1

52.8

 

T2

62.5

78.2

% Speaks it "very well"

T1

38.5

74.1

 

T2

48.2

77.7

Non-English Language

 

 

 

% Speaks it "very well"

T1

74.0

44.8

 

T2

78.1

49.9

Ethnic Self-Identityb

 

 

 

% "American"

T1

0.0

2.8

 

T2

0.0

2.0

% Hyphenated American

T1

14.7

40.4

 

T2

12.1

39.3

% National origin

T1

33.5

8.2

 

T2

67.9

26.3

% Racial/pan-ethnic

T1

51.3

44.9

 

T2

18.8

27.7

% Mixed ethnicity, other

T1

0.4

3.7

 

T2

1.3

4.8

Ethnic Identity Saliencec

 

 

 

"How important is this identity to you?"

T2

 

 

% Very important

 

73.2

65.5

% Somewhat important

 

18.8

25.1

% Not important

 

8.0

9.4

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

Characteristics by National Origin and Nativitya

Philippines

 

Vietnam

Cambodiab

FB

US

FB

US

FB

English Language

 

 

 

 

 

% Prefers English

81.4

95.8

43.9

91.5

67.0

 

92.6

98.0

69.0

91.5

85.2

% Speaks it "very well"

75.2

94.3

45.9

95.7

48.9

 

83.3

93.6

47.8

89.4

50.0

Non-English Language

 

 

 

 

 

% Speaks it "very well"

23.2

2.0

41.3

10.6

33.3

 

23.0

3.6

38.7

4.3

33.3

Ethnic Self-Identityb

 

 

 

 

 

% "American"

0.3

5.2

2.4

8.5

2.3

 

1.0

2.0

0.0

2.1

0.0

% Hyphenated American

50.8

66.2

43.9

70.2

46.6

 

21.9

48.4

28.2

51.1

30.7

% National origin

41.8

21.5

45.9

19.1

40.9

 

72.7

42.5

56.1

36.2

48.9

% Racial/pan-ethnic

3.5

1.2

0.4

0.0

1.1

 

0.6

2.0

14.5

8.5

20.5

% Mixed ethnicity, other

3.5

5.9

7.5

2.1

9.1

 

3.9

5.2

1.2

2.1

0.0

Ethnic Identity Saliencec

 

 

 

 

 

"How important is this identity to you?"

 

 

 

 

 

% Very important

75.5

65.2

58.9

61.7

57.5

% Somewhat important

21.0

26.2

26.1

29.8

29.9

% Not important

3.5

8.6

15.0

8.5

12.6

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

 

Laos

Characteristics by National Origin and Nativitya

 

Laob

Hmongb

Time

FB

FB

English Language

 

 

 

% Prefers English

T1

51.7

66.0

 

T2

74.1

58.0

% Speaks it "very well"

T1

44.1

22.0

 

T2

49.0

30.0

Non-English Language

 

 

 

% Speaks it "very well"

T1

42.0

50.0

 

T2

40.6

44.0

Ethnic Self-Identityb

 

 

 

% "American"

T1

0.7

4.0

 

T2

0.7

0.0

% Hyphenated American

T1

28.7

26.0

 

T2

19.6

12.0

% National origin

T1

61.5

62.0

 

T2

67.1

48.0

% Racial/pan-ethnic

T1

2.1

2.0

 

T2

11.2

38.0

% Mixed ethnicity, other

T1

7.0

6.0

 

T2

1.4

2.0

Ethnic Identity Saliencec

 

 

 

"How important is this identity to you?"

T2

 

 

% Very important

 

58.2

78.0

% Somewhat important

 

30.5

11.3

% Not important

 

14.0

8.0

a FB = foreign-born children; US = U.S.-born children.

b Responses to the open-ended survey question: "How do you identify, that is, what do you call yourself?" "Hispanic," "Chicano," "Latino," "Black,'' and "Asian" are classified as racial or pan-ethnic identities; a "Hmong" ethnic identity is included under "national origin"; "Cuban-Mexican" or "Chinese-Thai" are under "mixed" identities.

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

Characteristics by National Origin and Nativitya

All Others

 

Total

 

 

FB

US

FB

US

Total

English Language

 

 

 

 

 

% Prefers English

55.7

92.9

56.1

78.4

66.0

 

72.7

99.0

75.8

89.8

82.0

% Speaks it "very well"

59.8

93.9

52.2

86.2

67.3

 

70.5

93.9

58.5

87.0

71.2

Non-English Language

 

 

 

 

 

% Speaks it "very well"

49.4

11.2

43.4

20.3

33.1

 

50.6

18.2

43.7

25.7

36.3

Ethnic Self-Identityb

 

 

 

 

 

% "American"

3.4

18.4

1.3

5.8

3.3

 

3.4

9.2

0.6

2.7

1.6

% Hyphenated American

18.2

38.8

35.8

53.0

43.4

 

9.1

25.5

20.2

42.4

30.1

% National origin

44.3

11.2

44.3

15.7

31.6

 

18.2

11.2

60.7

32.3

48.1

% Racial/pan-ethnic

22.7

17.3

13.2

19.8

16.1

 

58.0

40.8

15.8

16.8

16.2

% Mixed ethnicity, other

11.4

14.3

5.4

5.7

5.5

 

11.4

13.3

2.7

5.7

4.0

Ethnic Identity Saliencec

 

 

 

 

 

"How important is this identity to you?"

 

 

 

 

 

% Very important

60.2

53.1

67.1

63.6

65.5

% Somewhat important

22.7

29.2

23.4

26.2

24.6

% Not important

17.0

17.7

9.5

10.2

9.8

c A follow-up question asked "How important is this identity to you, that is, what you call yourself?" The highest salience scores were found among those identifying by national origin; the lowest were among those identifying as "American"; in between were the salience scores for hyphenated American and racial/pan-ethnic identities.

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

FIGURE 9-3 Percentages who preferred English, at T1 and T2, San Diego children of immigrants sample, by (top) nativity and (bottom) national origin.

nities. There is little reason to doubt, based on these findings, that the linguistic outcomes for the third generation—the grandchildren of the present wave of immigrants—will be any different than what has been the age-old pattern in American immigration history: the grandchildren may learn a few foreign words and phrases as a quaint vestige of their ancestry, but they will most likely grow up speaking English only.

Ethnic Identity Shifts and Perceptions of Discrimination

In both surveys an identical open-ended question was asked to ascertain each respondent's ethnic self-identity. The results (and the wording of the question) are presented in the middle

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

panel of Table 9-6. Four main types of ethnic identities became apparent: (1) a plain "American" identity; (2) a hyphenated American identity; (3) a national origin identity (e.g., Mexican, Filipino, Vietnamese); and (4) a pan-ethnic minority identity (e.g., Hispanic, Latino, Chicano, Asian, black). The way adolescents see themselves is significant. Self-identities and ethnic loyalties can often influence patterns of behavior and outlook independent of the status of their families or the types of schools that children attend. That significance is confirmed by the students themselves: the overwhelming majority perceive their ethnic identity as "important" to themselves and over half deem it "very important.'' Ethnic self-identities vary significantly over time—yet not in a straight-line fashion, like an arrow, as was the case with the language shift to English, but in a reactive nonlinear dialectical fashion, rather more like a boomerang. The data in Table 9-6 illustrate that pattern compellingly.

In 1992 almost a third (32 percent) of the sample identified by national origin; the largest proportion (43 percent) chose a hyphenated American identification, a small fraction (3.3 percent) identified as plain "American," and 16 percent selected pan-ethnic minority identities. Whether a youth was born in the United States or elsewhere made a great deal of difference in the type of identity selected at T1: the foreign born were three times more likely to identify by national origins (44 percent) than were the U.S. born (16 percent); conversely, U.S.-born youth were much more likely to identify as "American" or hyphenated American than were the foreign born and somewhat more likely to identify in pan-ethnic terms. Those findings at T1 seemed suggestive of an assimilative trend from one generation to another. But by the T2 survey (conducted in the months after the passage, with 59 percent of the vote, of Proposition 187 in California in November 1994) the results were quite the opposite from what would have been predicted by a straight-line identificational assimilation perspective.

In 1995 the biggest gainer by far in terms of the self-image of these youth was the foreign nationality identity, increasing from 32 percent of the sample at T1 to nearly half (48 percent) now. This shift took place among both foreign-born and U.S.-born youth, as Table 9-6 shows. This occurred among most but not all

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

national origin groups and was particularly sharp among youth of Mexican and Filipino descent. Overall, pan-ethnic identities remained at 16 percent at T2, but that figure conceals a notable decline among Mexican-origin youth in "Hispanic" and "Chicano" self-identities and an extremely sharp upswing in the proportion of youth now identifying pan-ethnically as ''Asian" or "Asian American," especially among the smallest groups such as the "other Asians" (Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Thai) and the Hmong among the Indochinese. The simultaneous rapid decline of both the plain "American" (cut in half to a miniscule 1.6 percent) and hyphenated American (dropping from 43 to 30 percent) self-identities points to the rapid growth of a reactive ethnic consciousness. Furthermore, the measure of the salience or importance that the youth gave to their chosen identities (not shown in the table) showed that the strongest salience scores were reported for national origin identities and the weakest for plain "American" ones, with hyphenates scoring in between in salience.

Change over time, thus, has been not toward assimilative mainstream identities (with or without a hyphen) but rather a return to and a valorization of the immigrant identity for the largest groups and toward pan-ethnic identities among the smallest groups, as these youth become increasingly aware of the ethnic and racial categories in which they are classified by mainstream American society—and this among a sample of children of immigrants less than 2 percent of whom self-report racially as "white."

The process of growing ethnic awareness is also evident in the evolution of their perceptions, experiences, and expectations of racial and ethnic discrimination. These are detailed in the bottom panel of Table 9-6. Reported experiences of discrimination against themselves increased from 64 to 69 percent of the sample in the last survey (see Figure 9-4). Virtually every group reported more such experiences of rejection or unfair treatment as they grew older, with the Hmong registering the sharpest increase (to 82 percent), but about two-thirds of every other nationality in San Diego uniformly reported such experiences.

There is little doubt that racial and ethnic prejudice is the main factor driving such negative experiences. Among those suffering discrimination, their own race or nationality are the overwhelming forces perceived to account for that unfair treatment. Further-

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

FIGURE 9-4 Percentages who experienced being discriminated against, by national origin, San Diego children of immigrants sample.

more, such experiences of discrimination tend to be associated over time with the development of a distinctly more pessimistic stance about their chances to reduce discriminatory treatment on meritocratic grounds through higher educational achievement. As Table 9-6 shows, in both surveys the students were asked to agree or disagree with the statement, "No matter how much education I get, people will still discriminate against me." In 1992, 37 percent of the total sample agreed with that gloomy assessment; by 1995-1996 the proportion had grown to 41 percent. Such expectations of external discrimination on ascribed rather than achieved grounds—and thus of perceived danger and threatening circumstances beyond one's control—were found in a multivariate analysis of the original survey data to be significant predictors of depressive symptomatology (see Rumbaut, 1994a). That finding, as will be shown in the following section, is now confirmed again three years later.

Perhaps because of their awareness of racial discrimination

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

and ethnic inequality, second-generation youth are not ready to endorse all aspects of American society. Asked how often they prefer "American ways," an identical minority of 41 percent in both surveys reported that they did so most of the time. Instead the majority of children of immigrants take a selective stance, preferring American ways only some of the time. Nonetheless, it is important to emphasize as well that despite their growing awareness of the realities of American racism and intolerance, most continue to affirm a sanguine belief in the promise of equal opportunity through educational achievement—including nearly 60 percent in the latest survey who disagreed with the statement that people will discriminate against them regardless of educational merit. Even more tellingly, 63 percent of these youth agreed in the original survey that "there is no better country to live in than the United States," and that endorsement grew to 71 percent three years later. Majorities of every nationality, regardless of whether they were foreign born or U.S. born, agreed with that appraisal, ranging from nearly 60 percent among the Mexicans and Cambodians to a high of 85 percent among U.S.-born children of the 1975 Vietnamese refugees, whose families generally experienced a supportive and welcoming context of reception through a historic resettlement program organized by the U.S. government.

Psychological Well-Being: Patterns and Predictors of Self-Esteem and Depression

This final section examines two key cognitive and affective dimensions of psychosocial adaptation and well-being: self-esteem and depression. The measure of global self-esteem used is the 10-item Rosenberg scale. Depressive symptoms are measured with the four-item Center for Epidemiological Studies-Depression (CES-D) subscale. Both are scored on a scale of I to 4 as the mean of the items composing the measure (the composition, scoring, and reliability of these widely used scales are specified in Appendix 9A). Self-esteem and depression are inversely related (the correlation between the two measures at T1 was -0.362, and at T2 it was -0.418), but they are determined by distinct sets of factors and thus are not simply two sides of the same psychological coin, as will be made clear by the results of multiple linear regressions.

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

Furthermore, the T1 score on each scale is significantly but only moderately correlated with the T2 score on the same scale three years later (0.411 for self-esteem, 0.297 for depression), suggesting that considerable change occurs over time in the psychological dimensions of well-being tapped by these measures, particularly with regard to depressive symptoms.

Table 9-7 sketches a detailed picture of self-esteem and depression scores at T1 and T2, broken down by gender for a wide range of hypothesized predictors: national origin, nativity, age at arrival, citizenship, socioeconomic status, family structure and parent-child conflict, English proficiency and preference, aspirations, ethnic self-identity, and experiences and expectations of discrimination. These bivariate results portray the differing social patterning of each of the measures of psychological well-being: some of the predictor variables (e.g., parent-child conflict) show clear and significant linear relationships with both well-being outcomes, while others are significantly associated with one but not the other (e.g., U.S. citizenship, parents' education, and English preference are significantly associated with self-esteem but not with depression, while being discriminated against is much more strongly linked with depression than with self-esteem). These data are presented separately by gender because of the very significant differences found between males and females on both measures: females report significantly lower self-esteem and higher levels of depressive symptomatology, a finding consistent with other studies of adolescents and adults among both immigrants and natives and majority and minority populations (see Vega and Rumbaut, 1991). However, as depicted in Table 9-7 and Figure 9-5, for both males and females in this sample there is a statistically significant if moderate increase in self-esteem from T1 to T2, while for both males and females their slightly higher scores in depressive symptoms by T2 are not significantly different.

A least squares multiple linear regression analysis of each of these two dependent variables—self-esteem and depression as of T2, when these youth were nearing the end of adolescence and secondary schooling—is presented in Table 9-8. Both equations examine the independent net effects of the same five sets of predictor variables hypothesized to influence self-esteem and depres-

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

TABLE 9-7 Self-Esteem and Depression Among Male and Female Children of Immigrants:a Patterns of Psychological Well-Being and Change Over Time, 1992 (T1) and 1995 (T2)

Correlatesb of Psychological Well-Being

Male

Female

Total

T1

T2

T1

T2

T1c

T2c

SELF-ESTEEM

 

 

 

 

 

 

Total

3.23

3.33

3.17

3.26

3.20

3.29

National Origin

 

 

 

 

***

***

Mexican

3.19

3.38

3.17

3.33

3.18

3.36

Filipino

3.33

3.37

3.20

3.27

3.26

3.32

Vietnamese

3.10

3.17

3.10

3.12

3.10

3.15

Cambodian

3.21

3.35

2.96

3.07

3.06

3.18

Lao

3.03

3.17

3.08

3.18

3.06

3.17

Hmong

3.01

3.24

2.97

3.09

2.99

3.17

Others

3.45

3.41

3.38

3.41

3.41

3.41

Nativity

 

 

 

 

***

***

Foreign born

3.16

3.29

3.11

3.21

3.13

3.25

U S. born

3.33

3.38

3.24

3.33

3.28

3.35

Age at Arrival

 

 

 

 

***

***

All life in U.S.

3.33

3.38

3.24

3.33

3.28

3.35

0-5 years old

3.21

3.32

3.20

3.29

3.21

3.31

6-11 years old

3.19

3.27

3.08

3.14

3.13

3.20

12-15 years old

2.93

3.20

2.87

3.09

2.91

3.15

U.S. Citizenship

 

 

 

 

***

***

Citizen

3.33

3.37

3.24

3.31

3.28

3.34

Not a citizen

3.10

3.24

3.06

3.16

3.08

3.20

Mother's Education

 

 

 

 

***

***

College graduate

3.35

3.35

3.24

3.25

3.29

3.30

High school graduate

3.33

3.41

3.23

3.34

3.28

3.38

Less than high school

3.13

3.27

3.11

3.22

3.12

3.24

Father's Occupation

 

 

 

 

***

***

White collar

3.35

3.36

3.24

3.31

3.29

3.33

Blue collar

3.25

3.36

3.18

3.31

3.09

3.33

Not in labor force

3.10

3.24

3.09

3.15

3.09

3.19

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

Correlatesb of Psychological Well-Being

Male

Female

Total

T1

T2

T1

T2

T1c

T2c

SELF-ESTEEM

 

 

 

 

 

 

Family Economic Status

 

 

 

 

NS

**

Better than 3 years ago

3.24

3.38

3.18

3.30

3.21

3.35

Same as 3 years ago

3.24

3.30

3.17

3.23

3.20

3.27

Worse than 3 years ago

3.17

3.25

3.11

3.25

3.14

3.25

Family Structure

 

 

 

 

***

**

Both natural parents

3.27

3.34

3.18

3.29

3.23

3.31

Two-parent stepfamily

3.19

3.38

3.21

3.23

3.20

3.31

Single-parent family

3.10

3.26

3.08

3.19

3.09

3.22

Parent-Child Conflict

 

 

 

 

***

***

Low conflict

3.36

3.45

3.28

3.39

3.32

3.42

Medium conflict

3.10

3.18

3.03

3.13

3.06

3.15

High conflict

2.70

2.91

2.80

2.84

2.75

2.87

Embarrassed of Parents

 

 

 

 

***

***

No

3.27

3.34

3.20

3.28

3.24

3.31

Yes

3.09

3.24

2.98

3.13

3.04

3.19

English Proficiency

 

 

 

 

***

***

Speaks it "very well"

3.36

3.41

3.26

3.35

3.31

3.38

Speaks it "well"

3.02

3.15

2.99

3.05

3.00

3.11

Speaks it "not well"

2.81

2.95

2.79

2.78

2.80

2.86

English Preference

 

 

 

 

***

***

Prefers English

3.30

3.37

3.20

3.28

3.25

3.32

Prefers other language

3.10

3.15

3.10

3.17

3.10

3.16

Educational Aspirations

 

 

 

 

***

***

Advanced degree

3.34

3.51

3.30

3.37

3.32

3.43

College degree

3.27

3.30

3.11

3.24

3.20

3.27

Less than college degree

3.08

3.14

3.00

3.05

3.05

3.11

Occupational Aspirations

 

 

 

 

*

*

High-status profession

3.29

3.35

3.19

3.28

3.23

3.31

Middle-status job

3.23

3.30

3.10

3.18

3.17

3.25

Low-status job

3.15

3.27

3.16

3.14

3.15

3.23

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

Correlatesb of Psychological Well-Being

Male

Female

Total

T1

T2

T1

T2

T1c

T2c

SELF-ESTEEM

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ethnic Self-Identity

 

 

 

 

NS

NS

American

3.36

3.48

3.54

3.08

3.42

3.33

Hyphenated American

3.29

3.38

3.19

3.32

3.24

3.35

National origin

3.13

3.28

3.10

3.23

3.12

3.26

Racial/pan-ethnic

3.25

3.39

3.16

3.23

3.20

3.30

Mixed identity, other

3.26

3.23

3.23

3.40

3.24

3.32

Experienced Discrimination

 

 

 

 

***

NS

Has been discriminated against by others

3.22

3.31

3.12

3.25

3.17

3.28

Has not been . . .

3.27

3.36

3.25

3.27

3.26

3.31

Expected Discrimination

 

 

 

 

**

***

Will be discriminated against despite merit

3.19

3.27

3.13

3.20

3.16

3.24

Will not be . . .

3.26

3.38

3.19

3.29

3.22

3.33

DEPRESSIVE SYMPTOMS

 

 

 

 

 

 

Total

1.54

1.57

1.75

1.79

1.65

1.68

National Origin

 

 

 

 

NS

*

Mexican

1.56

1.52

1.76

1.76

1.66

1.64

Filipino

1.52

1.59

1.81

1.86

1.66

1.72

Vietnamese

1.62

1.62

1.70

1.76

1.66

1.69

Cambodian

1.57

1.53

1.73

1.69

1.66

1.63

Lao

1.52

1.57

1.64

1.57

1.58

1.57

Hmong

1.56

1.61

1.80

1.94

1.66

1.76

Others

1.39

1.62

1.72

1.86

1.57

1.75

Nativity

 

 

 

 

NS

NS

Foreign born

1.56

1.59

1.76

1.79

1.66

1.69

U.S. born

1.51

1.55

1.75

1.79

1.63

1.67

Age at Arrival

 

 

 

 

*

NS

All life in U.S.

1.51

1.55

1.75

1.79

1.63

1.67

0-5 years old

1.53

1.58

1.72

1.77

1.63

1.68

6-11 years old

1.54

1.59

1.76

1.78

1.66

1.69

12-15 years old

1.69

1.61

1.88

1.93

1.77

1.75

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

Correlatesb of Psychological Well-Being

Male

Female

Total

T1

T2

T1

T2

T1c

T2c

DEPRESSIVE SYMPTOMS

 

 

 

 

 

 

U.S. Citizenship

 

 

 

 

NS

NS

Citizen

1.52

1.56

1.74

1.78

1.63

1.67

Not a citizen

1.57

1.60

1.78

1.82

1.68

1.71

Mother's Education

 

 

 

 

NS

NS

College graduate

1.47

1.63

1.76

1.85

1.61

1.74

High school graduate

1.53

1.57

1.73

1.76

1.63

1.66

Less than high school

1.57

1.55

1.77

1.79

1.67

1.67

Father's Occupation

 

 

 

 

**

NS

White collar

1.51

1.59

1.62

1.77

1.59

1.68

Blue collar

1.50

1.54

1.78

1.76

1.64

1.65

Not in labor force

1.63

1.61

1.78

1.82

1.71

1.72

Family Economic Status

 

 

 

 

***

***

Better than 3 years ago

1.51

1.49

1.73

1.76

1.62

1.62

Same as 3 years ago

1.52

1.58

1.74

1.75

1.64

1.67

Worse than 3 years ago

1.83

1.81

1.85

1.94

1.84

1.88

Family Structure

 

 

 

 

***

***

Both natural parents

1.50

1.54

1.71

1.76

1.60

1.65

Two-parent stepfamily

1.67

1.54

1.90

1.83

1.78

1.68

Single-parent family

1.66

1.72

1.85

1.88

1.76

1.81

Parent-Child Conflict

 

 

 

 

***

***

Low conflict

1.43

1.43

1.61

1.64

1.52

1.53

Medium conflict

1.67

1.78

1.94

1.95

1.81

1.87

High conflict

2.03

2.03

2.30

2.21

2.16

2.13

Embarrassed of Parents

 

 

 

 

***

*

No

1.51

1.56

1.72

1.78

1.62

1.67

Yes

1.66

1.65

1.93

1.86

1.78

1.75

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

Correlatesb of Psychological Well-Being

Male

Female

Total

T1

T2

T1

T2

T1c

T2c

DEPRESSIVE SYMPTOMS

 

 

 

 

 

 

English Proficiency

 

 

 

 

**

NS

Speaks it "very well"

1.51

1.57

1.73

1.80

1.62

1.69

Speaks it "well"

1.59

1.59

1.78

1.77

1.68

1.67

Speaks it "not well"

1.67

1.59

1.92

1.82

1.79

1.70

English Preference

 

 

 

 

NS

NS

Prefers English

1.52

1.55

1.74

1.80

1.63

1.68

Prefers other language

1.58

1.66

1.78

1.73

1.68

1.69

Educational Aspirations

 

 

 

 

**

NS

Advanced degree

1.48

1.50

1.68

1.77

1.60

1.66

College degree

1.51

1.57

1.79

1.80

1.64

1.68

Less than college degree

1.63

1.66

1.84

1.83

1.72

1.73

Occupational Aspirations

 

 

 

 

NS

NS

High-status profession

1.53

1.58

1.75

1.77

1.65

1.68

Middle-status job

1.52

1.52

1.70

1.89

1.60

1.68

Low-status job

1.57

1.57

2.00

1.90

1.66

1.68

Ethnic Self-Identity

 

 

 

 

***

*

American

1.48

1.50

1.57

2.08

1.51

1.72

Hyphenated American

1.52

1.56

1.76

1.75

1.64

1.66

National origin

1.59

1.58

1.76

1.80

1.68

1.69

Racial/pan-ethnic

1.51

1.52

1.74

1.76

1.63

1.66

Mixed identity, other

1.54

1.85

1.73

1.97

1.63

1.91

Experienced Discrimination

 

 

 

 

***

***

Has been discriminated against by others

1.59

1.63

1.84

1.83

1.72

1.73

Has not been . . .

1.45

1.44

1.60

1.72

1.52

1.59

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

Correlatesb of Psychological Well-Being

Male

Female

Total

T1

T2

T1

T2

T1c

T2c

DEPRESSIVE SYMPTOMS

 

 

 

 

 

 

Expected Discrimination

 

 

 

 

***

***

Will be discriminated against despite merit

1.64

1.68

1.83

1.89

1.73

1.77

Will not be . . .

1.47

1.48

1.71

1.74

1.60

1.62

a Measured by the 10-item Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (1-4) and the four-item CES-D depression subscale (1-4). See Appendix 9A for the items composing the two scales and their scoring. The longitudinal sample of 2,063 is evenly split between males (1,023) and females (1,040).

b All variables as measured at T1 and T2, reflecting changes over time, except constants such as gender, national origin, generation, age at arrival, parents' education, and parents' ethnicity; that is, psychological well-being outcomes at T1 reported in this table are associated with predictor variables (such as family structure and English proficiency) measured at T1 and T2 outcomes with variables measured at T2.

c Statistical significance of differences in group mean scores: *p < .05, **p < .01, ***p < .001; NS = not significantly different.

sion: (1) gender, national origin, and age at arrival in the United States (a four-point scale, with 0 = born in the United States, 1 = 0 to 5 years of age at arrival, 2 = 6 to 10 years, and 3 = 11 to 15 years); (2) intrafamily contexts and stressors; (3) extra-family contexts and stressors (including expected discrimination, the school indices previously discussed, friends' no-college plans, and the proportion of the neighborhood population that speaks English only, as an indicator of contextual dissonance); (4) achievement and aspiration variables; and (5) two items dealing with concerns over one's physical appearance and popularity with the opposite sex. Standardized regression coefficients and t ratios are shown for all significant effects, and the change in the square of the multiple correlation coefficient (ΔR2) upon the entry of each set of predictor variables is noted as an indicator of the "explained" variance contributed by those predictors. The full model shown explains about 45 percent of the variance in self-esteem scores (R2 = 0.454) and about half as much of the variance in depression

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

FIGURE 9-5 (Top) Global self-esteem score, at T1 and T2, San Diego children of immigrants sample, by gender and (bottom) CES-D depression score, at T1 and T2, by gender.

scores, 22 percent (R2 = 0.223). Some of the most salient results of these analyses merit highlighting.

First, as had been found earlier in multiple regressions with the T1 data, gender remains one of the most significant predictors of both well-being measures even after controlling for a score of other variables. Significantly lower self-esteem and much higher levels of depressive symptoms are observed for females in this sample; and the effect for self-esteem is considerably reduced after the entry of the last set of variables (concern with physical

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

looks and popularity with the opposite sex). Age at arrival washes out of the self-esteem equation but remains significantly associated with depression: the more recently arrived the immigrant (and the older age at time of arrival), the higher the depression score, net of other factors. That finding is consistent with T1 results as well and with the expectations of theories of acculturative stress among immigrants. The national origin dummy variables entered, however—Filipino and Vietnamese ethnicity—wash out of the depression equation but are significantly linked to lower self-esteem. This again confirms the T1 finding that among national origin groups only the Filipinos and Vietnamese reflect statistically significantly lower self-esteem scores, again raising questions about possible psychosocial vulnerabilities and dynamics among these two groups of children of immigrants, not captured by the data, that may be linked to a diminished sense of self-worth.

The findings are all the more intriguing in view of recent reports by the Centers for Disease Control, based on surveys in San Diego and elsewhere, that found Filipinos in San Diego schools as reporting the highest levels of suicidal ideation and attempts of any major ethnic group, despite the comparative socioeconomic advantages of that population (Kann et al., 1995). Similar findings have been supported in a separate study by Wolf (1997) of Filipino youth in two California sites. No other nationalities showed significant associations with either dependent variable in other models tested, a finding that is of particular interest in the case of the Cambodian youth, given the elevated levels of depression and posttraumatic stress symptoms found among adult Cambodian refugees, including Cambodian parents in San Diego (see Rumbaut, 1991a; Rumbaut and Ima, 1988).

Second, intrafamily factors have very significant effects on both dependent variables, particularly the measure of parent-child conflict, which, as in T1, emerges as one of the principal predictors of emotional well-being in these populations. By contrast, family structure washes out of the self-esteem equation and retains a weak though still significant protective effect against depressive symptoms. A stronger effect is seen for the measure of family cohesion. Perceptions of downward economic mobility in the family's situation are significantly associated with depression

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

TABLE 9-8 Predictors of Self-Esteem and Depressive Symptoms Among Children of Immigrants: Least-Squares Multiple Regressions for San Diego Sample, T2 (1995-96)a

 

Self-Esteem (Mean = 3.298)

Predictor Variables

Beta

T ratio

p

ΔR2

Gender, Age at Arrival, Ethnicity

 

 

 

0.033***

Gender (0 = male, 1 = female)

-0.056

(-3.12)

**

 

Age at arrival in the United Statesb

 

 

NS

 

Filipino

-0.075

(-3.85)

***

 

Vietnamese

-0.065

(-3.49)

***

 

Intrafamily Contexts and Stressors

 

 

 

0.147***

Intact family

 

 

NS

 

Parent-child conflict

-0.180

(-9.15)

***

 

Family cohesion

0.091

(4.85)

***

 

Family economic situation worse

 

 

NS

 

Family moved to another home

0.068

(3.97)

***

 

Seriously ill or disabled since T1

-0.056

(-3.34)

**

 

Extra-Family Contexts and Stressors

 

 

 

0.026***

English-only in neighborhood

-0.046

(-2.57)

**

 

School perceived as unsafe

-0.086

(-4.77)

***

 

Teaching quality and fairness

 

 

NS

 

School stress events experienced

 

 

NS

 

Friends' no-college plans

 

 

NS

 

Discrimination trumps education

 

 

NS

 

Achievement and Aspirations

 

 

 

0.098***

Educational achievement (GPA)

0.069

(3.49)

***

 

Educational aspirations

0.143

(7.21)

***

 

English language proficiency

0.197

(9.30)

***

 

LEP status at T1

-0.068

(-3.10)

**

 

Looks and Opposite Sex

 

 

 

0.150***

Dissatisfied with physical looks

-0.343

(-19.58)

***

 

Popular with opposite sex

0.169

(9.66)

***

 

R2

 

 

 

0.454

Adjusted R2

 

 

 

0.448

a Standardized regression coefficients (betas), with T ratios in parentheses. ΔR2= change in the square of the multiple correlation coefficient. Significance levels *p < .05, **p < .01, ***p < .0001; NS = not significant. See Appendix 9A for details of measurement.

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

 

CES-D Depression (Mean = 1.681)

Predictor Variables

Beta

T ratio

p

ΔR2

Gender, Age at Arrival, Ethnicity

 

 

 

0.032***

Gender (0 = male, 1 = female)

0.165

(7.72)

***

 

Age at arrival in the United Statesb

0.044

(1.93)

*

 

Filipino

 

 

NS

 

Vietnamese

 

 

NS

 

Intrafamily Contexts and Stressors

 

 

 

0.127***

Intact family

-0.048

(-2.36)

*

 

Parent-child conflict

0.200

(8.52)

***

 

Family cohesion

-0.050

(-2.24)

*

 

Family economic situation worse

0.055

(2.70)

**

 

Family moved to another home

 

 

NS

 

Seriously ill or disabled since T1

0.045

(2.21)

*

 

Extra-Family Contexts and Stressors

 

 

 

0.024***

English-only in neighborhood

0.067

(3.13)

**

 

School perceived as unsafe

0.042

(1.97)

*

 

Teaching quality and fairness

-0.042

(-1.97)

*

 

School stress events experienced

0.050

(2.18)

*

 

Friends' no-college plans

0.058

(2.61)

**

 

Discrimination trumps education

0.054

(2.58)

**

 

Achievement and Aspirations

 

 

 

0.001 NS

Educational achievement (GPA)

 

 

NS

 

Educational aspirations

 

 

NS

 

English language proficiency

 

 

NS

 

LEP status at T1

 

 

NS

 

Looks and Opposite Sex

 

 

 

0.039***

Dissatisfied with physical looks

0.185

(8.85)

***

 

Popular with opposite sex

-0.069

(-3.33)

**

 

R2

 

 

0.223

 

Adjusted R2

 

 

0.215

 

b A four-point variable, where 0 = born in the United States, 1 = 0 to 5 years old at arrival, 2 = 6 to 10 years old at arrival, and 3 = 11 to 15 years old at arrival. It is an index of both length of residence in the United States and, if foreign born, age/developmental stage at arrival in the United States.

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

but not self-esteem. Family contexts clearly if varyingly shape psychological outcomes among these youth.

The third set of predictor variables begins to show more significant divergences among the determinants of the two well-being outcome variables. Four of the predictors in that set wash out of the self-esteem equation but retain significant net effects on depressive symptoms—notably expectations of discrimination (underscoring the point made earlier), as well as stressful school events experienced, and the decision of most close friends to not go to college (but instead to drop out or get a job). These variables appear generally to have in common the experience of perceived danger and lack of control over threatening life events—characteristics that have been specifically associated with depressive symptomatology. Interestingly, the proportion of English-only speakers in the neighborhood—an indicator of contextual dissonance—emerges as a significant predictor of both lower self-esteem and higher depression. The finding lends support to theoretical predictions, following Rosenberg (1979), that self-esteem should be lower in contexts where social dissimilarity is greater, along with exposure to negative stereotypes and reflected appraisals of one's group of origin.

The fourth set of predictors has to do with competence in role performance —variables that measure educational achievement and aspirations and achieving a command of English. All of these have strong and significant effects on self-esteem, but all of them wash out of the equation predicting depressive symptoms. The explained variance contributed by this set of predictors to the self-esteem equation is a robust 10 percent (0.098 added to the R2) but virtually zero to the depression equation (adding a mere 0.001 to the R2).

Finally, the last two items entered have significant net effects on both equations—although the added explained variance to the self-esteem model contributed by these two items is far greater than that for the depression model (0.150 to 0.039). Indeed, the item indicating dissatisfaction with one's physical looks had the largest beta coefficient in the final self-esteem model, and its entry into the model significantly reduced the direct effect of gender on self-esteem. It is worth noting here that females were about twice as likely as males (29 to 17 percent) to report dissatisfaction

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

with their looks at T2. And among national origin groups, the most dissatisfied with their physical looks were the Vietnamese and Filipinos, with the Vietnamese also being the most likely to report not feeling popular with the opposite sex.

In all of these respects it becomes clear that self-esteem and depressive symptoms are measures of different cognitive and affective dimensions of psychological well-being, subject to a different set of determinants, which throw additional light on the adaptational challenges that children of immigrants confront in their passages to adulthood in American contexts. In some respects the patterns are quite similar to what one would expect to find with a sample of nonimmigrant nonminority youth. In others the findings frame what at first appears as an ''achievement paradox": for example, recently arrived, lower socioeconomic status immigrant youth work harder and achieve better grades than their more assimilated native-born peers yet have a poorer psychological well-being profile, much as females too consistently outperform their male counterparts yet register lower self-esteem and higher depression. And in still other respects—particularly with regard to issues of nonnative language competency, contextual dissonance, recency of arrival, entry into a minority status, and experiences and expectations of ethnoracial discrimination—our results suggest that children of immigrants face distinct acculturative challenges and the potential for intergenerational conflict over these issues within their families that significantly add to the developmental challenges of adolescence.

Despite these added challenges—or perhaps because of them—the overall picture that emerges from this study is one of noteworthy achievement and resilient ambition in a situation of extraordinary diversity. Whether and to what extent these can be sustained as these youth make their entry into the world of work and careers, as they form new families of their own, and as they seek to carve out a meaningful place in the years ahead in the society of which they are the newest members—and whether and to what extent their already diverging trajectories will diverge further still as they become exposed to and absorbed by different segments of American society—are open empirical questions that will remain unanswered until the new century that beckons them ahead.

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This chapter is based on data collected in San Diego, California, by the Children of Immigrants Longitudinal Study. I gratefully acknowledge the support provided by research grants from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation (1991-1996) and the Russell Sage Foundation (1994-1996). The study was conceived and conducted in collaboration with Alejandro Portes and carried out in conjunction with a parallel survey in South Florida directed by Professor Portes and funded by additional grants from the Spencer, Russell Sage, and National Science foundations. The project in the San Diego area, which I directed, was made possible by the generous cooperation of over 2,000 immigrant families and scores of administrators, principals, teachers, and other staff members of the San Diego City Schools; by the assistance extended by the sociology departments of San Diego State University and Michigan State University; by the work of a team of over two dozen interviewers fluent in Spanish, Tagalog, Vietnamese, Cambodian, Lao, Hmong, and other languages representative of the immigrant families that have made San Diego their home; and by the extraordinary commitment of my core research staff, especially Linda Borgen, Norm Borgen, Kevin Keogan, Laura Lagunas, and James Ainsworth. I am indebted to Charles E Hohm, Leif Jensen, and Donald J. Hernandez for their careful comments on an earlier version of this chapter and to the National Research Council's Committee on the Health and Adjustment of Immigrant Children and Families, under whose auspices this chapter was prepared.

REFERENCES

Hansen, K.A., and C.S. Faber 1997 The foreign born population: 1996. Current Population Reports, P20-494. Washington, D.C.: Bureau of the Census, U.S. Department of Commerce.


Kann, L., et al. 1995 Youth risk behavior surveillance—United States, 1993. Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report 44(SS-1):1-56.


Oropesa, R.S., and N.S. Landale 1997 In search of the new second generation: Alternative strategies for identifying second generation children and understanding their acquisition of English. Sociological Perspectives 40(3).

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

Portes, A. 1995 Children of immigrants: Segmented assimilation and its determinants. Pp. 248-279 in The Economic Sociology of Immigration: Essays on Networks, Ethnicity, and Entrepreneurship, A. Portes, ed. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.

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Portes, A., and R.G. Rumbaut 1996 Immigrant America: A Portrait, 2nd ed. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Portes, A., and R. Schauffler 1996 Language acquisition and loss among children of immigrants. Pp. 432-443 in Origins and Destinies: Immigration, Race, and Ethnicity in America, S. Pedraza and R.G. Rumbaut, eds. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.


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Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

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Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
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APPENDIX 9A

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

TABLE 9A-1 Composition and Reliability of Selected Scales, and Scoring of Items, at T1 and T2 (San Diego longitudinal sample, N = 2,063)

 

Cronbach's Alpha

Scale and Scoring

T1

T2

Rosenberg self-esteem

(10 items: scored 1 to 4)

0.81

0.81

CES-D depression (four items: scored 1 to 4)

0.74

0.77

Familism scale (three items: scored 1 to 4)

0.60

0.62

Family cohesion scale (three items: scored 1 to 5)

0.84

Parent-child conflict (three items: scored 1 to 4)

0.58

0.63

(Fourth item added at T2)

0.72

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

Scale and Scoring

Items and Measures

Rosenberg self-esteem (10 items: scored 1 to 4)

I feel I am a person of worth, at least on an equal basis with others.

I feel I have a number of good qualities.

I am able to do things as well as most other people.

I take a positive attitude toward myself.

On the whole, I am satisfied with myself.

All in all, I am inclined to think I am a failure [reverse score].

I feel I do not have much to be proud of [reverse score].

I wish I could have more respect for myself [reverse score].

I certainly feel useless at times [reverse score].

At times I think I am no good at all [reverse score].

1 = Disagree a lot, 2 = Disagree, 3 = Agree, 4 = Agree a lot

CES-D depression (four items: scored 1 to 4)

[How often during the past week:]

I did not feel like eating; my appetite was poor.

I could not "get going."

I felt depressed.

I felt sad.

1 = Rarely, 2 = Some of the time (1 or 2 days a week),

3 = Occasionally (3 or 4 days), 4 = Most of the time (5 to 7 days)

Familism scale (three items: scored 1 to 4)

One should find a job near his/her parents even if it means losing a better job somewhere else.

When someone has a serious problem, only relatives can help.

In helping a person get a job, it is always better to choose a relative rather than a friend.

1 = Disagree a lot, 2 = Disagree, 3 = Agree, 4 = Agree a lot

Family cohesion scale (three items: scored 1 to 5)

Family members like to spend free time with each other.

Family members feel very close to each other.

Family togetherness is very important.

1 = Never, 2 = Once in a while, 3 = Sometimes, 4 = Often, 5 = Always

Parent-child conflict

(three items: scored 1 to 4)

(Fourth item added at T2)

In trouble with parents because of different way of doing things.

My parents are usually not very interested in what I have to say.

My parents do not like me very much.

My parents and I often argue because we don't share the same goals.

1 = Not true at all, 2 = Not very true, 3 = Partly true, 4 = Very true

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

 

Cronbach's Alpha

Scale and Scoring

T1

T2

Educational aspirations (two items: scored 1 to 5)

0.80

0.83

English proficiency index (four items: scored 1 to 4)

0.94

0.93

Foreign language index (four items: scored 1 to 4)

0.96

0.92

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
×

 

Items and Measures

Educational aspirations (two items: scored 1 to 5)

What is highest level of education you would like to achieve?

And realistically speaking, what is the highest level of education you think you will get?

1 = Less than high school, 2 = High school, 3 = Some college, 4 = Finish college,

5 = Finish a graduate degree

English proficiency index (four items: scored 1 to 4)

How well do you (speak, understand, read, write) English?

1 = Not at all, 2 = Not well, 3 = Well, 4 = Very well

Foreign language index (four items: scored 1 to 4)

How well do you (speak, understand, read, write) [foreign languages]?

1 = Not at all, 2 = Not well, 3 = Well, 4 = Very well

Suggested Citation:"9 Passages to Adulthood: The Adaptation on Children of Immigrants in Southern California." National Research Council. 1999. Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/9592.
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Immigrant children and youth are the fastest-growing segment of the U.S. population, and so their prospects bear heavily on the well-being of the country. Children of Immigrants represents some of the very best and most extensive research efforts to date on the circumstances, health, and development of children in immigrant families and the delivery of health and social services to these children and their families.

This book presents new, detailed analyses of more than a dozen existing datasets that constitute a large share of the national system for monitoring the health and well-being of the U.S. population. Prior to these new analyses, few of these datasets had been used to assess the circumstances of children in immigrant families. The analyses enormously expand the available knowledge about the physical and mental health status and risk behaviors, educational experiences and outcomes, and socioeconomic and demographic circumstances of first- and second-generation immigrant children, compared with children with U.S.-born parents.

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