Behavioral Compliance and Emotional Vulnerability: Immigrant Parentage and Legal Precarity Among Second-Generation Latinx Youth

• In Event: Sociology of Education Section Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): Table 20. School Dynamics: Behavior, Achievement, and Discipline

Abstract

Immigration enforcement has become a central feature of the contemporary U.S. carceral state, yet its consequences extend beyond those formally subject to detention and deportation. This study examines how legal precarity shapes the institutional and emotional experiences of U.S.-born citizen children of immigrants. Drawing on theories of legal violence and multigenerational punishment, I conceptualize school discipline as a site where the intergenerational reach of immigration governance becomes visible.

Using data from the Future of Families and Child Wellbeing Study (FFCWS), I analyze how immigrant parentage, distinguished by parental nativity and documentation status, is associated with school suspension, perceived school safety, and generalized fear among second-generation Latinx youth. Results indicate that, relative to children of native-born Latinx citizen mothers, children of undocumented Latinx mothers are significantly less likely to be suspended, net of socioeconomic controls. However, documentation status does not consistently predict perceptions of school safety or generalized fear. Additionally, ESL enrollment is negatively associated with suspension but strongly positively associated with generalized fear.

These findings suggest that reduced disciplinary contact does not necessarily signal protection or well-being. Instead, within legally precarious households, citizen children may regulate visible conduct in response to parental deportability while emotional vulnerability persists. By distinguishing nativity from documentation status and examining behavioral and emotional outcomes simultaneously, this study demonstrates that immigration enforcement structures the lives of citizen children indirectly, extending carceral governance across generations.

Author

• Oralia Maria Zamarripa, Texas A&M University-College Station