Communicating about Risky Behaviors: African American and Hispanic/Latino Parents and Daughters

Background: Parenting and communication styles may differ between races and ethnic groups. Furthermore, level of acculturation may have further effects on communication among Hispanic/Latino populations. These factors must be considered for creating and disseminating appropriate messages to enhance parent-daughter communication. This study explored how parents and daughters communicate about important issues.

Methods: Sixteen focus groups were conducted to examine how African American and Hispanic/Latino parents communicate with their pre-and early teenage daughters about a series of important and sensitive topics. African American parent groups were segmented by daughters' age (9 to11 and 12 to14 years old). Hispanic/Latino parent groups were further segmented by level of acculturation. Groups with girls (aged 12 to 14 only) were segmented by race/ethnicity.

Results: Results examined how race, ethnicity, level of acculturation, and daughters' age affected communication in areas including: responding to wrongdoing, communicating expectations, and preventing risky and promoting positive behaviors. Parents' materials format and content preferences were also elicited. Differences related to race/ethnicity, level of acculturation, and daughters' age were observed. In some cases, African American parents and acculturated Hispanic/Latino parents share similarities, while unacculturated Hispanic/Latino parents are different. In other cases, Hispanic/Latino parents, regardless of level of acculturation, are more similar with each other than with African American parents.

Conclusions: Cultural differences in communication styles and parental expectations between African American and Hispanic/Latino parents can affect the needs for content, timing, format, and dissemination of effective and appropriate education messages to enhance parent-daughter communication.