Many academic and public policies promote rapid immigrant assimilation. Yet, researchers have recently identified an emerging pattern, known as the "immigrant paradox," in which assimilated children of immigrants experience diminishing developmental outcomes and educational achievements.
This volume examines these controversial findings by asking how and why highly acculturated youth may fare worse academically and developmentally than their less assimilated peers, and under what circumstances this pattern is disrupted.
This timely compilation of original research is aimed at understanding how acculturation affects immigrant child and adolescent development. Chapters explore the question "Is Becoming American a Developmental Risk?" through a variety of lenses — psychological, sociological, educational, and economic. Contributors compare differential health, behavioral, and educational outcomes for foreign- and native-born children of immigrants across generations.
While economic and social disparities continue to present challenges impeding child and adolescent development, particularly for U.S.-born children of immigrants, findings in this book point to numerous benefits of biculturalism and bilingualism to preserve immigrants' strengths.
Contributors
Preface
Introduction
Cynthia García Coll and Amy Kerivan Marks
I. Is There an "Immigrant Paradox"?
- Children in Immigrant Families: Demography, Policy, and Evidence for the Immigrant Paradox
Donald J. Hernandez, Nancy A. Denton, Suzanne Macartney, and Victoria L. Blanchard
- Historical Origins of the Immigrant Paradox for Mexican American Students: The Cultural Integration Hypothesis
Raymond Buriel
- Studying the Immigrant Paradox in the Mexican-Origin Population
Robert Crosnoe
II. Behavior and Health Outcomes Across Generations
- Behavioral Outcomes in Early Childhood: Immigrant Paradox or Disadvantage?
Kristen Turney and Grace Kao
- Exploring the Immigrant Paradox in Adolescent Sexuality: An Ecological Perspective
Marcela Raffaelli, Hyeyoung Kang, and Tristan Guarini
- Immigrant Generational Status and Delinquency in Adolescence: Segmented Assimilation and Racial–Ethnic Differences
Hoan N. Bui
III. Family and Community Factors Affecting Academic Outcomes
- Bilingualism and Academic Achievement: Does Generation Status Make a Difference?
Wen-Jui Han
- An Immigrant Advantage in the Early School Trajectories of Latino Preschoolers From Low-Income Immigrant Families
Natalia Palacios
- Student Engagement, School Climate, and Academic Achievement of Immigrants' Children
Suet-ling Pong and Kristina L. Zeiser
- Immigrant Gateway Communities: Does Immigrant Student Achievement Vary by Location?
Dylan Conger and Meghan Salas Atwell
- In Spite of the Odds: Undocumented Immigrant Youth, School Networks, and College Success
Roberto G. Gonzales
- Immigrant Youth in Postsecondary Education
Lingxin Hao and Yingyi Ma
IV. Concluding Remarks
- The Intersection of Aspirations and Resources in the Development of Children From Immigrant Families
Andrew J. Fuligni
Index
About the Editors
Cynthia García Coll, PhD, is the Charles Pitts Robinson and John Palmer Barstow Professor of Education, Psychology and Pediatrics at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island. She has published on the sociocultural and biological influences on child development with particular emphasis on at-risk and minority populations. She has been on the editorial boards of many academic journals, including Child Development, Development and Psychopathology, Infant Behavior and Development, and Infancy and Human Development and is the current editor of Developmental Psychology. She was a member of the MacArthur Foundation Network's "Successful Pathways Through Middle Childhood" from 1994 to 2002.
Dr. García Coll has coedited several books: The Psychosocial Development of Puerto Rican Women; Puerto Rican Women and Children: Issues in Health, Growth and Development; Mothering Against the Odds: Diverse Voices of Contemporary Mothers; and Nature and Nurture: The Complex Interplay of Genetic and Environmental Influences on Human Behavior and Development.
She is a fellow of APA. Presently, her scholarship is largely focused on the role of race and ethnicity in children's development, specifically, the role of culture, acculturation, and different sources of oppression (i.e., poverty, racism, and discrimination) in shaping human development.
Amy Kerivan Marks, PhD, is an assistant professor and the director of graduate and undergraduate studies in psychology at Suffolk University in Boston, Massachusetts. She is coauthor with Cynthia García Coll of the book Immigrant Stories: Ethnicity and Academics in Middle Childhood, and has published numerous other edited and peer-reviewed works on the acculturation, ethnic identities, and development of immigrant youth.
Her doctoral work on the measurement of ethnic identities was supported by a graduate fellowship from the National Science Foundation, and her current work is supported by the W. T. Grant and Jacobs Foundations.
Dr. Marks was recently awarded a Jacobs Foundation Young Scholar Award for her research with immigrant youth. Her present research is focused on understanding person–context interactions in the development of ethnically and racially diverse children and adolescents.
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