ASIAN AMERICAN/EUROPEAN AMERICAN AND LATINO/A/EUROPEAN AMERICAN MULTIRACIAL PSYCHOLOGY STUDENTS IN HIGHER EDUCATION: ACADEMIC BARRIERS, ACADEMIC SUPPORTS, PERCEPTIONS OF CULTURAL DIVERSITY, AND EXPERIENCES

Abstract

Demographic trends suggest increasing numbers of multiple racial heritage students attending US campuses and universities, a change reflected within psychology. However, there is little empirical investigation into the educational needs of multiracials. The current project addressed this gap by utilizing quantitative survey and qualitative interview data from a recently conducted national study to explore the perceptions of multiracial undergraduate and graduate students within psychology. The focus of the current study was the comparison of Asian American/European American and Latino/a/European American multiracial students to their single heritage counterparts on several variables of interest - academic supports and barriers; linkage between barriers faced and ethnicity; perceived cultural diversity; and perceptions of the extent of cultural diversity related to satisfaction. Furthermore, exploratory differences in these variables related to multiracial self-identification and the variables of satisfaction, specialness and representation in psychology were examined. Both multiracial groups reported more of a link between academic barriers experienced and their ethnicity than European American students, but less of a link than their monoracial minority peers. Also, both multiracial groups were more likely to report that their ethnic group was not represented in psychology than fairly represented, compared to European American peers, but less likely to report this compared to their monoracial minority counterparts. The same pattern of findings existed for student's perceptions that psychology had something special to offer their ethnic group. In other cases, differences were not found between the multiracial groups and their monoracial counterparts, or between the two multiracial groups.