In honor of National Hispanic Heritage month, September 15 to October 15, Add Health would like to highlight some of the important discoveries our researchers have found thanks to our Hispanic American participants.
High educational aspirations, high expectations about attending college, high parent-child relationship quality, and high friends’ GPAs were found to be the most important predictors of both high school and college graduation among Hispanic adolescents. Friends’ lack of substance use was also a significant predictor for college graduation. (Chapin 2019).
Close social bonds with parents were found to be a very important protective factor against violent crime victimization for Latino adolescents and young adults. The especially close monitoring offered by immigrant Latino parents was especially protective for their adolescent and young adult children. (Lopez and Miller 2021).
Both Latino and Black Americans are more likely to experience unfair police treatment compared with Whites. Further, Latinos with medium brown, dark brown, or black skin tones are more likely to experience unfair treatment by police than those with lighter skin. The authors provide ideas for reducing the excess unfair treatment experienced by Latino and Black persons in American society, especially those with darker skin tones. (Finkeldey et al. 2022).
In their late 30s, Hispanic adults exhibit favorable patterns of physical functioning compared with White adults in the United States, with the favorable patterns being especially pronounced among Hispanic immigrants and second-generation Hispanics. These findings point to the generally favorable health of Hispanic immigrants and the children of Hispanic immigrants in the United States. (Touma and Hummer 2022).
For more important findings, visit the Add Health publications page.