Discrimination Matters: Relations of Perceived Discrimination to Student Mental Health

Mollie R. Weeks; Amanda L. Sullivan

doi:10.1007/s12310-019-09309-1

Discrimination Matters: Relations of Perceived Discrimination to Student Mental Health

Mollie R. Weeks, Amanda L. Sullivan

Educational Psychology

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

34 Scopus citations

Abstract

Although instances of discrimination are increasing across US schools, little is known about the relations of discrimination to mental health outcomes across the full range of school ages or how experiences of discrimination interact with various sociodemographic characteristics. This study entailed analysis of data from approximately 60,700 respondents to the 2011–2012 National Survey of Children’s Health to explore the associations between racial/ethnic discrimination and depression, anxiety, oppositional defiant disorder, and conduct disorder for children and youth ages 6–17. Multivariate logistic regression indicated that experiencing racial discrimination was associated with significantly increased odds of having a range of mental health problems including depression, anxiety problems, and behavior disorders. Moreover, an interaction effect was observed between discrimination, race, and anxiety. No interactions were observed for variables related to age groupings. Implications for school-based mental health practitioners and researchers are discussed.

Original language	English (US)
Pages (from-to)	425-437
Number of pages	13
Journal	School Mental Health
Volume	11
Issue number	3
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1007/s12310-019-09309-1
State	Published - Sep 1 2019

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
Data analyses, interpretations, and conclusions are credited to the author and not the NSCH which was only responsible for initial data collection. The contents of this report were developed under a grant from the US Department of Education, # H325D160016. However, those contents do not necessarily represent the policy of the US Department of Education, and you should not assume endorsement by the Federal Government. Project Officer, Sarah J. Allen, Ph.D. Special thanks are due to the Center for Applied Research and Educational Improvement student consultants for assistance with data analysis and imputation pooling.

Publisher Copyright:
© 2019, Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature.

Keywords

Externalizing disorders
Internalizing disorders
Racial discrimination
School-based mental health services
Social-emotional wellbeing

UN SDGs

This output contributes to the following UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

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Discrimination Matters: Relations of Perceived Discrimination to Student Mental Health

Abstract

Bibliographical note

Keywords

UN SDGs

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