The Effects of Asian American Studies on Asian American College Students' Psychological Functioning

Because Asian American college students are commonly perceived to be highly achieving and functioning, psychosocial outcomes other than academic achievements are understudied. Nonetheless, stereotypes and racism have consistently been shown to be detrimental to Asian American students' psychological well-being and racial identity (e.g., Kodama, McEwen, Osajima, 1993). Researchers promoting a model of Asian American college student identity development (Kodama, McEwen, Liang, & Lee, 2002) advocate student participation in multicutural programming and education to affirm and foster students' positive racial identity. Two studies examined the hypothesis that for Asian American students, participation in multicultural education and programming buffers stresses associated with racial minority status at a predominantly White institution of higher learning. Study 1 used longitudinal survey data to investigate the effects of multicultural programming and social experiences on collective self-esteem and general psychological well-being among first-year Asian American undergraduates. Study 2 used a quasi-experimental design to examine the effects of participating in a racial identity-focused intergroup dialogue versus a general Asian American studies class and a control group on outcomes such as collective self-esteem and general psychological well-being. The results from both studies indicate that participation in Asian American-specific coursework and race-specific extracurricular activities (e.g., awareness month events) may provide a positive and buffering effect on race-related collective self-esteem. These findings support a contemporary model of Asian American college student development and may influence university departments to consider promoting race-specific diversity coursework and activities for Asian American students.

Name thesis:degree_name

Ph.D.

Level thesis:degree_level

Dissertation

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Psychology

Grantor

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Year dc:date

2015

Author dc:creator

• Lee, Matthew R.

Contributors dc:contributor

• Okazaki, Sumie

• Education, Bilingual and Multicultural

Language dc:language

eng

Identifier

(MiAaPQ)AAI3337876

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/82166