Social Connection and Multiracial Individuals

What’s the Issue:

Multiracial individuals can experience alienation from multiple different types of racial groups.  The feelings of alienation can be a result of a sense of disconnection from other groups. On the other had, because multiracial people have more than one racial identity they may experience an increase in social connectedness and have many friends, but still have feelings of not belonging with those people.  Additionally, multiracial people experience discrimination equivalent to those who are monoracial, thus discrimination can act as a vehicle for social exclusion.

What’s the Purpose of the Investigation:

The purpose of the investigation is to better understand racism and social connection for multiracial individuals. Franco sought  to examine how discrimination towards multiracial people can impact their feelings of social connection with specific racial groups.  The study also uses different factors of social connectedness such as acceptance, commonality, and friendship to evaluate how they are intertwined with racism and feelings of social connection.

What are the results?

 The more that multiracial people experienced racial discrimination, they felt that they were less accepted and had less in common with White people.  Additionally, they had fewer White friends as their experiences of discrimination increased. When participants were also asked about experiences of discrimination specific to their multiracial identity, they reported these same feelings of less acceptance and less in common with White peers. Overall, feelings of both racial and multiracial discrimination can be equated to less social connectedness with White people.

What are the Implications?

When faced with discrimination, multiracial individuals feel less socially connected to those who are White and generally feel more social connection with people who share their minority racial group.  With this,  more discrimination relates to less life satisfaction for multiracial individuals due to satisfaction within their communities.

Franco, M. (2019). Let the racism tell you who your friends are: The effects of racism on social connections and life-satisfaction for Multiracial people. International Journal of Intercultural Relations, 69, 54–65. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijintrel.2018.12.005