For generations, American families of color have talked with their children about what it means to grow up in a society where race and ethnicity can shape how they are seen and treated. These talks can include teaching children about their family’s history and culture, instilling pride in their identity, preparing them to respond to discrimination, and helping them understand how to respond when they encounter racism.

Sometimes called ethnic-racial socialization, these conversations are a longstanding way for parents and caregivers to help children understand race, ethnicity, and racism, while developing a sense of cultural identity. But the conversations, of course, don’t look the same in every family. A new University of Minnesota School of Public Health (SPH) study examines how ethnic-racial socialization varies across Black families. By comparing immigrant and nonimmigrant Black American families, the study examined how different cultural backgrounds and experiences shape both the messages parents share about race and identity and how those messages are understood by their children.

“Black Americans are an increasingly ethnically diverse population, but much of what we know about how Black families talk with their children about race comes from research that doesn’t fully capture that diversity,” said J’Mag Karbeah, SPH assistant professor and lead author. “We wanted to understand what these conversations look like across Black families with different immigration histories.”

To conduct the study, researchers held focus groups with Black parents and adolescents from both nonimmigrant and immigrant families in the Twin Cities. Most of the immigrant parents participating were originally from Somalia, with several participants from West African countries. Parents and adolescents participated in separate discussions about the messages families share around race and ethnicity, experiences with discrimination, and how young people understand and respond to the messages they receive from their parents.

Published in Frontiers in Public Health, the study found:

• While all families emphasized cultural pride, it was expressed in different ways. Immigrant families, particularly Somali American families, often rooted that pride in religion, language, food, and country of origin, while nonimmigrant Black families drew more on family lineage, Black history, and the American civil rights experience.
• Nonimmigrant Black families placed greater emphasis on preparing children for racial bias and discrimination. These parents were more likely to discuss experiences such as profiling, incarceration, and structural racism when preparing their children for how they might be treated. Nearly 40 percent of comments from nonimmigrant parents involved preparation for bias, compared with about one in five comments from immigrant parents.
• Immigrant families were more likely to emphasize equality across racial groups. These parents often encouraged their children to see people as equals regardless of race, even while acknowledging that racism and discrimination exist in the U.S. Their conversations also reflected the experience of navigating multiple cultures.

“Black families aren’t a monolith, and the ways parents help their children understand race, culture, and discrimination are shaped by their own histories and experiences,” said Karbeah. “If we want to support the mental health and well-being of Black adolescents, we need to recognize those differences while also building on the cultural strengths families are already using to help young people develop a strong sense of identity and resilience.”

Researchers noted that future studies should include larger and more diverse groups of Black immigrant families. Additional research could also examine how conversations about race and identity change across generations and as immigrant families spend more time in the U.S.