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1. Developmental Trajectories of Science Identity Beliefs: Within-Group Differences among Black, Latinx, Asian, and White Students

   https://doi.org/10.1007/s10964-021-01493-1  

   Puente, Kayla; Starr, Christine R.; Eccles, Jacquelynne S.; Simpkins, Sandra D. (January 2021, Journal of Youth and Adolescence)

   null (Ed.)

   Though adolescents’ science identity beliefs predict positive STEM outcomes, researchers have yet to examine developmental differences within racial/ethnic groups despite theoretical arguments for such studies. The current study examined science identity trajectories for Black (14%), Latinx (22%), Asian (4%), and White (52%) students (N = 21,170; 50% girls) from 9th grade to three years post-high school and the variability within each racial/ethnic group based on gender and college generational status. Contrary to the literature, students’ science identities increased over time, and the increases were larger for potential first- versus continuing-generation White students. Potential continuing-generation boys had stronger 9th grade science identities than potential first-generation girls in all groups except Asians. The findings suggest who might benefit from additional supports within each racial/ethnic group. 

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2. CS Teaching and Racial Identities in Interaction: A Case for Discourse Analytic Methods

   Hubbard Cheuoua, Aleata (August 2023, 2023 ACM Conference on International Computing Education Research)

   Motivation. Teachers can play a role in disrupting social inequities that are reflected in education, such as racial disparities in who succeeds in CS. Professional learning addressing inequities causes teachers to confront difficult topics, including how their own identities impact these problems. Understanding the differing ways teachers’ identities surface can provide insights into designing better supports for their professional learning. Objectives. The goal of this paper is to examine the teaching and racial identities of two secondary CS teachers who participated in professional learning focused on combining CS content and equity pedagogy. The second goal of this paper is to demonstrate how discourse analytic methods can be used to examine interviews and other interactional data. Method. Teachers were interviewed individually about their teaching identity, racial identity, and professional learning. Drawing on Bucholtz and Hall’s identity and interaction framework, interviews were examined for linguistic and discursive features reflecting positionality (i.e., how identity surfaces through the way individuals present themselves to and are perceived by others) and indexicality (i.e., various ways of referring to an identity). Results. Participants used personal deictics, quotative markers, code choice, and affective and epistemic stances when discussing and negotiating their identities with the interviewer. The data reflected ways teachers problematized questions about teaching identity, negotiated tensions in their disciplinary identities, found the topic of race difficult to address, and highlighted other aspects of their identities relevant to understanding and discussing race. Discussion. The study provides a demonstration of how discourse analytic methods can reveal nuances of teacher identity that may be overlooked with other qualitative approaches. Findings also revealed how teachers’ ethnic identities might be used as a lever in helping teachers discuss the difficult topic of race in education. Discourse analytic methods are encouraged for future CS education research focused on interactional analyses. 

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3. Adopting a multi-systems approach: examining the academic belongingness of first-generation college students with multiple stigmatized identities in STEM

   https://doi.org/10.3389/feduc.2023.1183907  

   Google, Angela N.; Sekaya, Grace; McMullen, Zachery; Henning, Jeremiah A. (August 2023, Frontiers in Education)

   First-generation college students often experience greater social alienation and marginalization due to a mismatch of their cultural values compared to those of their university and often report lower academic satisfaction and sense of belonging. The effects on sense of belonging and satisfaction are intensified when first-generation college students have identities that intersect with other stigmatized social and cultural identities, like low socioeconomic status, Black or Latinx racial identities or religious identities, specifically for STEM majors. Students’ holistic health and well-being, including their sense of belonging, is highly correlated to their academic achievement, persistence, and overall student success, especially for underrepresented minority groups. However, there has been limited consideration for the nuanced experiences of first-generation college students with multiple stigmatized identities, and for how the academic STEM environment shapes student’s perceptions of inclusivity considering their social identities. To address these concerns, we used the Bioecological Systems theory to contextualize drivers of sense of belonging for students with stigmatized social and cultural identities by allowing space to explicitly consider institutional, departmental, classroom and societal-level phenomena that may operate to erode or fortify belonging for some individuals over others. Findings were organized contextually first, revealing how broader societal and familial values shaped their perceptions of their first-generation identity. Next, we reported how various forms of engagement and interactions with institutional agents impacted their perceptions of support at the institutional level. We then documented behavioral patterns within STEM departments that culminated to reveal how first-generation college students’ sense of belonging was impacted by perceived departmental culture. Last, we revealed interactions within STEM classrooms that signaled inclusivity through humanizing and intentional pedagogical practices. Infused throughout all findings are instances where student experiences were mediated through their multiple identities and were shaped by dual global pandemics of 2020, that being COVID-19 and the racial unrest resurfaced by the murder of George Floyd. Implications for this work have the potential to restructure how institutions provide support for first-generation college students given the salience of their intersecting stigmatized identities in shaping their institutional, disciplinary, and classroom belonging. 

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4. Child development at the intersection of race and SES: An overview

   https://doi.org/10.1016/bs.acdb.2019.05.002  

   Henry, D. A. (January 2019, Advances in child development and behavior)

   Henry, D. A. (Ed.)

   Racial/ethnic disparities in socioeconomic status (SES) persist in the United States. These disparities perpetuate the intergenerational transmission of inequality. Although families of color vary significantly in socioeconomic standing and evidence suggests the links between SES and child development may differ by race/ethnicity, we know relatively little about how race and SES interact to shape children's social contexts and developmental outcomes. This chapter draws theoretical insights from sociocultural perspectives on development and intersectionality theory to understand how and why family life and child development may play out in complex ways at the nexus of race and SES. 

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5. Race/ethnicity and Worry about the Threat of Flooding: A Mediation Analysis of Perceived Risk Versus Preparedness

   https://doi.org/10.1080/23251042.2024.2367265  

   Anderson, Kathryn Freeman; Hart, Nicole; Rifai, Hanadi S (June 2024, Environmental Sociology)

   Research has demonstrated that natural disasters, like flooding that are increasing with climate change, can have profound mental health effects. Moreover, these outcomes are not experienced evenly across the population with disadvantaged populations like racial/ethnic minorities and lower socio-economic status individuals being more likely to report psychological diagnoses and symptoms related to floods. However, the mechanisms that could account for the link between social vulnerability and worry about the threat of flooding remain poorly understood. In this analysis, we use a 2022 survey of Houston-area residents to examine how perceived flood risk and subjective flood preparedness relate to racial/ethnic differences in worry about the threat of flooding. We find that both individual-level and area-level race/ethnicity are significantly related to greater worry about the threat of flooding. Further, this is partially mediated by perceived flood risk, but not subjective flood preparedness. This suggests that policies and infrastructure priorities that reduce risk rather than prepare households for flooding would accomplish more in closing the gap in social disparities in mental health outcomes from flooding. 

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