Back to Annual Meeting Page		American Public Health Association 133rd Annual Meeting & Exposition December 10-14, 2005 Philadelphia, PA

Abstract #112171

Michael Yonas, DrPH, Department of Health Behavior and Health Education, University of North Carolina, 323-A Rosenau Hall, CB 7440, Chapel Hill, NC 27599, 919-966-9557, myonas@email.unc.edu, Vanessa Jeffries, MEd, Chatham County Health Department, PO Box 130, Pittsboro, NC 27312, Tonya Headen-Lee, Chatham County Public Health Department, Teenworks Teen Center, 505 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., Siler City, NC 27344, and Eugenia Eng, DrPH, Health Behavior and Health Education, University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill, Rosenau Hall - Campus Box 7440, Chapel Hill, NC 27599-7400.

Institutional and population-level efforts to address diversity and racism are essential to cultivating common understanding, respect, and acceptance necessary for young people to achieve their greatest potential. The ability to manage racism and prejudice as social stressors is also an important protective factor for health. A dramatic change in the racial/ethnic composition of many communities underlies the importance of understanding how diversity, prejudice and racism influence positive youth development. This collaboration between a university and local health department utilized a community-based participatory research approach to explore how young People of Color and their families characterize and negotiate cultural and racial diversity, perceived racism and prejudice. Twenty-four adolescent boys and girls (11-14y) from diverse ethnic backgrounds and their guardians were recruited from a multicultural after-school initiative. Qualitative methodology included the use of focus groups supplemented by extensive participant observation to elicit perceptions of social, cultural and environmental factors about managing diversity. Open-ended and semi-structured questions were utilized to explore these issues and analyzed using a grounded theory approach. Emergent findings from focus group sessions illustrated how issues related to cultural diversity and perceived racism impact the lives of young people living in a rural setting. These findings impress the need to understand and address ethnic, cultural and racial identity among rural adolescents and may inform programming and policy efforts for youth living in racially/ethnically diverse communities. Utilizing these findings, subsequent intervention activities will teach youth how to manage diversity and become stronger community advocates for social change and promoting racial/ethnic tolerance.

Learning Objectives: At the conclusion of this session, the participant (learner)will be able to

• Recognize and articulate how racial/thnic diversity, prejudice and racism function as social stressors among rural adolescents
• Develop potential methodologies for exploring such issues for exploring these dynamics with other populations
• Describe the process of applying such findings to inform the development of targeted intervention activities

Keywords: Advocacy, Community-Based Public Health

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

I wish to disclose that I have NO financial interests or other relationship with the manufactures of commercial products, suppliers of commercial services or commercial supporters.

Recorded presentation