Racial socialization in White American families: An exploration of the roles of parental racial identity, parental racial attitudes, and racial socialization messages

Abstract

This paper explores the relationship among White parents’ racial attitudes, racial identity development, and racial socialization strategies. Parents were asked to use both quantitative measures and qualitative vignettes to report how they would talk to their pre-adolescent child about race. In line with previous research (Hughes et al., 2006), parents predominantly adopted an egalitarian socialization strategy, suggesting that everyone should be treated the same, regardless of race. Although White parents indicated they found both present and future discussions of race important, when given the opportunity with qualitative vignettes, many parents did not include race or racial issues in their responses. This indicates a pattern of colorblind or colormute socialization that has been reflected in White racial socialization literature; the idea that race should not matter and should not be discussed with children. Egalitarian socialization was linked to White racial identity statuses, but not related to racial bias or school diversity estimates.