Poster #89 - “I’d probably call myself Chinglish”: Chinese Adoptees’ Ethnic-Self-label and Parents’ Depth in Cultural Socialization

• In Event: Poster Session 18

Abstract

Intro: Parents cultivate children’s sense of pride about one’s culture and teach cultural knowledge to their children through cultural socialization (CS) (Hughes et al., 2006). Parents raising children adopted across race (transracial adoptees, TRAs) must also help their children develop a healthy sense of their ethnic identity (Pinderhughes et al., 2021). However, as parents who do not share their children’s ethnic heritage, TRA parents engage in CS without being cultural experts about Chinese culture. The current study examines how TRA parents’ depth of cultural socialization (Zhang & Pinderhughes, 2019) may be related to how Chinese American TRA girls label their ethnic identity and feel about their self-labeling.

Method: Thirty-nine child-parent dyads of Chinese American TRA families (Childage: M = 7.36 (SD = 1.18); Parentage: M = 49.84 (SD = 4.65)) from the New England and New York City area were home interviewed. All parents who reported their race were White. Children’s ethnic identity self-labels were grouped into four categories: bi-ethnic, monoethnic Chinese, monoethnic American, other, as were their feelings about their self-labeling (i.e., positive, negative, mixed, don’t know). Parent-reported CS activities were measured for depth using three indicators – Depth of Cultural Activity, Motivation for CS, and Attitudes about Cultural Difference. Each indicator was scored from 1-5 using specific criteria - See Legend in Figure 2 for brief descriptions.

Preliminary Findings: As shown in Figure 1, most TRA children labeled themselves as biethnic; children predominantly felt positive about their self-label. Figure 2 presents parents’ scores on each indicator of CS depth. For attitudes about cultural difference and depth of cultural activity, 49% of parents (n = 19) and 29% of parents (n = 11) had the highest possible score (5) (i.e., parents engaged in family-structured activities or communities involving cultural experts and had acknowledgement and salience of cultural difference greater than 70%). In contrast, 36% of parents (n = 14) had a score of 3 on motivation (i.e., reasons for CS were mixed and fit none of the other descriptions) (See Figure 2).

Children’s self-label quotes revealed various explanations for their label. For example, one child shared a complex perspective: “Well, some of it makes me feel happy that I know I’m from Chinese and from American. But sometimes it makes me feel bad because I’m not really like my friends.” This comment reflects positive feelings about the child’s connection to two cultures, yet being Chinese and American sets them apart from their peers; such feelings of being different elicited negative feelings.

The poster will present additional data on children’s self label and related feelings, and the relation among parents’ depth in CS, TRA children’s labeling, and feelings about self-label will be examined.

Implications: One study implication is that professionals should be mindful of how different aspects of parents’ cultural socialization may have an impact on TRA children’s developmental experiences, such as that of their identity development. Other future implications will be discussed.

Authors

• Seungmi Lee, Tufts University
  Presenting Author

• Xian Zhang, Tufts University

• Shiqian Cui, Tufts University

• Marisa Huang, Tufts University

• Hailing Wang, University of Pennsylvania

• Nika Renshaw, Tufts University

• Mollie Dion, Tufts University

• Grace Russell, Tufts University

• Ellen E. Pinderhughes, Tufts University