Interracial Families and the Racial Identification of Mixed-Race Children: Evidence from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study |
Social Forces
Volume 84, Number 2 (December 2005)
pages 1131-1157
DOI: 10.1353/sof.2006.0007
David L. Brunsma, Professor of Sociology
Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University
In this article, a nationally-representative sample of kindergarten-aged children is used from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study to explore the structure of parental racial designation of mixed-race children. The variation in these parental designations of a variety of mixed-race children is described. Parental racial designations in the three most common majority-minority interracial couplings – White/Hispanic, Black/White and Asian/White – are predicted using multinomial logistic regression models. The results may indicate a movement by the parents of these multiracial children away from minority status through racial labeling and towards “multiracial” and “White” – movements that are predicated upon gender, class and context. Critical discussions of the implications of these results as well as directions for future research are offered.
Read or purchase the article here.
Tags: David Brunsma, David L. Brunsma, Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Social Forces