Resilient Profiles and College Adjustment Among Students

Arizona State University-Tempe Campus, Tempe AZ

Investigators

Abstract

PROJECT SUMMARY Especially for racial/ethnic minority youth, a college degree can offer a pathway towards better wellbeing across the lifespan. Although many biracial students experience positive adjustment in college and go on to earn a college degree, over 35% of biracial students who begin college fail to earn a degree within 6 years. The lack of a college degree can have significant economic costs, and failure to complete a college degree can initiate a cascade of mental and physical effects. Biracial students may encounter unique stressors in college, such as discrimination, difficulty finding a place to ?fit?, and forming and shifting their identity across contexts and time. Stress can impair emotional, social, and academic adjustment; when chronic, stress can also cumulatively affect physiology via a process commonly termed allostatic load, affecting long-term mental and physical health. Despite these risks, biracial students may have access to unique sources of resilience, promoting positive adjustment. However, we have little understanding of factors that promote resilience among biracial youth transitioning to college. The proposed study will use a longitudinal approach to examine stress and resilience among biracial White/Hispanic college students. The project provides a chance to engage with this understudied population. Questionnaire and physiological data will be used to identify risk and resilient profiles of psychological, physiological, social, and cultural resources, which may promote or impair adjustment of biracial college students. The project will assess how these profiles affect stress, allostatic load, and trajectories of college adjustment over the first year of college. With the rapid growth of the biracial population in the U.S., filling gaps in research knowledge will help promote wellbeing among biracial individuals in college and into adulthood. An investigation of profiles of psychological, physiological, social, and cultural resilience resources is well-placed for translation into later preventative and intervention efforts with this understudied population.