The Effects of Perceived Discrimination on Immigrant and Refugee Physical and Mental Health

Magdalena Szaflarski · Shawn Bauldry

181 citations0/0 files storedEmerald Group Publishing Limited eBooks

No readable copy stored yet — this record is metadata only.

No open-access location is known for this record yet.

Literature note Cite in a project Citation map

Migration, Health and Trauma Migration, Refugees, and Integration Racial and Ethnic Identity Research

Abstract

PURPOSE: Discrimination has been identified as a major stressor and influence on immigrant health. This study examined the role of perceived discrimination in relation to other factors, in particular, acculturation, in physical and mental health of immigrants and refugees. METHODOLOGY/APPROACH: Data for US adults (18+ years) were derived from the National Epidemiologic Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions. Mental and physical health was assessed with SF-12. Acculturation and perceived discrimination were assessed with multidimensional measures. Structural equation models were used to estimate the effects of acculturation, stressful life effects, perceived discrimination, and social support on health among immigrants and refugees. FINDINGS: Among first-generation immigrants, discrimination in health care had a negative association with physical health while discrimination in general had a negative association with mental health. Social support had positive associations with physical and mental health and mediated the association of discrimination to health. There were no significant associations between discrimination and health among refugees, but the direction and magnitude of associations were similar to those for first-generation immigrants. IMPLICATIONS: Efforts aiming at reducing discrimination and enhancing integration/social support for immigrants are likely to help with maintaining and protecting immigrants' health and well-being. Further research using larger samples of refugees and testing moderating effects of key social/psychosocial variables on immigrant health outcomes is warranted. ORIGINALITY/VALUE: This study used multidimensional measures of health, perceived discrimination, and acculturation to examine the pathways between key social/psychosocial factors in health of immigrants and refugees at the national level. This study included possibly the largest national sample of refugees.

Paper brief

Loading…

Cite this work

Citation unavailable for this work.

BibTeX RIS CSL-JSON

No public copy is stored for this record, so only the metadata is cited.

Citations in this library

Citation map →

Stored only when both papers are in the corpus — 181 citations exist upstream.

References

1989Structural Equations with Latent Variables 2003Health Care Disparities 2009Perceived discrimination and health: A meta-analytic review.2011Mechanisms Linking Social Ties and Support to Physical and Mental Health 1990Ethnic identity in adolescents and adults: Review of research.2008Discrimination and racial disparities in health: evidence and needed research 1999Racism as a stressor for African Americans: A biopsychosocial model.1983Positive Events and Social Supports as Buffers of Life Change Stress 1

Cited by

2020Prejudice and Discrimination Toward Immigrants 2025Unequal weathering: How immigrants’ health advantage vanishes over the life-course 2025Parent and caregiver preferences for eHealth programs

Explore the map →

Papers that cite the same references — the relational fallback while embeddings are still backfilling.

Imported from OpenAlex (CC0) — nothing here is generated.