Matching Items (4)
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- All Subjects: Mexican American
- Creators: Gonzales, Nancy A.
Description
This dissertation examined Mexican American individuals' romantic relationships within two distinct developmental periods, adolescence and adulthood. Study 1 used latent class analysis to explore whether 12th grade Mexican Americans' (N = 218) romantic relationship characteristics, cultural values, and gender created unique romantic relationship profiles. Results suggested a three-class solution: higher quality, satisfactory quality, and lower quality romantic relationships. Subsequently, associations between profiles and adolescents' adjustment variables were examined via regression analyses. Adolescents with higher and satisfactory quality romantic relationships reported greater future family expectations, higher self-esteem, and fewer externalizing symptoms than adolescents with lower quality romantic relationships. Similarly, adolescents with higher quality romantic relationships reported greater academic self-efficacy and fewer sexual partners than adolescents with lower quality romantic relationships. Finally, adolescents with higher quality romantic relationships also reported greater future family expectations and higher academic self-efficacy than adolescents with satisfactory quality romantic relationships. To summarize, results suggested that adolescents engaged in three unique types of romantic relationships with higher quality being most optimal for their adjustment. Study 2 used latent growth modeling to examine marital partners' (N = 466) intra- and inter-individual changes of acculturative stress, depressive symptoms, and marital quality. On average across the seven years, husbands' acculturative stress remained steady, but wives' significantly decreased; partners' depressive symptoms remained relatively steady, but their marital quality significantly decreased. Although partners' experiences of acculturative stress were less similar than their experiences of depressive symptoms and marital quality, overall their experiences were interconnected. Significant spillover and crossover effects emerged between partners' initial levels of acculturative stress and depressive symptoms and between depressive symptoms and marital quality. Moreover, changes in husbands' depressive symptoms were negatively associated with changes in their marital quality. Overall, results suggested that partners' experiences were interconnected across time.
ContributorsMoosmann, Danyel A. V (Author) / Roosa, Mark W. (Thesis advisor) / Christopher, F. Scott (Committee member) / White, Rebecca M B (Committee member) / Millsap, Roger E (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2014
Description
Research demonstrating the importance of the paternal role has been largely conducted using samples of Caucasian men, leaving a gap in what is known about fathering in minority cultures. Family systems theories highlight the dynamic interrelations between familial roles and relationships, and suggest that comprehensive studies of fathering require attention to the broad family and cultural context. During the early infancy period, mothers' and fathers' postpartum adjustment may represent a critical source of influence on father involvement. For the current study, Mexican American (MA) women (N = 125) and a subset of their romantic partners/biological fathers (N = 57) reported on their depressive symptoms and levels of father involvement (paternal engagement, accessibility, and responsibility) during the postpartum period. Descriptive analyses suggested that fathers are involved in meaningful levels of care during infancy. Greater paternal postpartum depression (PPD) was associated with lower levels of father involvement. Maternal PPD interacted with paternal gender role attitudes to predict father involvement. At higher levels of maternal PPD, involvement increased among fathers adhering to less segregated gender role attitudes and decreased among fathers who endorsed more segregated gender role attitudes. Within select models, differences in the relations were observed between mothers' and fathers' reports of paternal involvement. Results bring attention to the importance of examining contextual influences on early fathering in MA families and highlight the unique information that may be gathered from separate maternal and paternal reports of father involvement.
ContributorsRoubinov, Danielle S (Author) / Luecken, Linda J. (Thesis advisor) / Crnic, Keith A (Committee member) / Enders, Craig K. (Committee member) / Gonzales, Nancy A. (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2014
Description
This study examined the influence of the traditional values held by Mexican heritage parents on the intention of their adolescent children to use drugs. Specifically, the study tested a mediation model in which the traditional cultural values of parents were hypothesized to influence adolescent drug use intentions indirectly by influencing ethnic identify and adolescent perceptions of parental injunctive norms against drug use. Parents reported on traditional cultural values and expectations for their child. Adolescents reported perceived reaction from parents if they used drugs (parental injunctive norms), ethnic identity, and their intention to use drugs in the future. Two direct effects were observed: parental values on expectations and parental injunctive norms on adolescent drug use intentions. Two paths were also moderated by the sex of the adolescent. The path from parent values to parent expectations was significantly stronger for adolescent girls than boys; the path from ethnic identity affirmation to drug intentions was protective for boys but not for girls. The negative relationship between perceived parental reaction and adolescent drug use intentions suggests that anti-drug norms communicated by parents had a protective influence and can deter youth from using drugs. The results of the current study did not support the hypothesized mediational model, but did provide additional support for the importance of parental influence on adolescents' plans and ideas about using alcohol, cigarettes, and marijuana. More research is necessary to examine the influence of culture and the mechanisms by which cultural values impact Mexican heritage adolescents' intentions to use drugs and subsequent use.
ContributorsGarvey, Meghan (Author) / Gonzales, Nancy A. (Thesis advisor) / Marsiglia, Flavio F. (Committee member) / Mackinnon, David P. (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2012
Description
Familism values have been shown to have a multitude of benefits for Mexican American youth. Understanding different pathways of the adoption of familism values from adolescence and young adulthood, and predictors of these pathways, is critical. The current study assessed different classes of change in familism values across five waves from fifth grade to young adulthood, and fifth-grade predictors of these profiles, among a sample of 749 Mexican American youth. Univariate and growth mixture modeling was used to determine classes of familism change and found two classes—one class that showed small, insignificant declines across adolescence that accelerated into young adulthood and one class that showed significant declines across adolescence that stabilized and increased into young adulthood. The three-step procedure was then used to examine the following fifth-grade predictors of familism classes: family conflict, family cohesion, harsh parenting, parental acceptance, economic hardship, and perceived ethnic discrimination. Family conflict and perceived ethnic discrimination were significant predictors of familism class membership. Greater family conflict predicted a greater probability of being in the class of significant declines in familism across adolescence that stabilized and increased into young adulthood. Greater perceived ethnic discrimination predicted a greater probability of being in the class of small, insignificant decreases across adolescence that accelerated into young adulthood. Gender moderated the impact of family cohesion. For females, greater father-reported family cohesion predicted a greater probability of being in the class with significant declines during adolescence that stabilized and increased into young adulthood. For males, greater father-reported family cohesion predicted a greater probability of being in the class with slight, insignificant declines in adolescence that accelerated into young adulthood. Youth nativity moderated the impact of maternal acceptance. For youth born in the U.S., greater mother-reported acceptance predicted a greater probability of being in the class of slight, insignificant declines across adolescence that accelerated into young adulthood. For youth born in Mexico, greater mother-reported acceptance predicted a greater probability of being in the class of significant declines in familism across adolescence that stabilized and increased into young adulthood. Limitations and implications for prevention and future research are discussed.
ContributorsJenchura, Emily C. (Author) / Gonzales, Nancy A. (Thesis advisor) / Knight, George P (Committee member) / Grimm, Kevin J. (Committee member) / Perez, Marisol (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2019