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Race and Racialized Identity: Development and Learning Pillar
Resources to help broaden representation related to race and racialized identity across the development and learning pillar of APA’s National Standards for High School Psychology Curricula
Research summaries
Suggested instructions: These research summaries can be incorporated into a lecture or shared with students as a reading to demonstrate how psychological science explores the diversity of human experience. These resources can also be used to encourage students to identify the major components of a research study (i.e., the hypothesis or study question, sample, method, and findings). Students can be asked to identify potential limitations of the study and encouraged to discuss the implications for our understanding of human behavior. Keywords highlight how concepts within and across pillars are incorporated into a single research study.
Sample research summaries
Adults delay conversations about race because they underestimate children’s processing of race
Study finds conversations between adults and children about race should happen earlier than they actually do
Study reveals infants make connections between the faces they see and the language they hear
Parents’ beliefs about children’s emotions and their conversations with children
Study examines the relationship between parents’ beliefs about emotions and how they teach children about emotions
Hands up, now what?: Black families' reactions to racial socialization interventions
Investigators examined the potential benefits of community interventions aimed at promoting racial socialization and psychological wellness
Psychologist profiles
Suggested instructions: These profiles can be shared with students to enhance the visibility of psychologists of diverse backgrounds. As an additional activity, students can be asked to conduct research to learn more about the psychologist and their work. An alternative assignment could be to ask students to find other psychologists of diverse backgrounds whose work falls into this content pillar. Keywords highlight how psychological scientists study concepts within and across pillars.
Sample psychologist profiles
Nationally renowned psychologist whose work has been devoted to improving the health of women and people of color
A member of the Caddo Tribe whose work focuses on child abuse and neglect, suicide prevention, and parent-child therapy
Distinguished psychologist whose research focuses on the challenges that American Indian/Alaska Native children and adolescents face
Recognized leader in clinical psychology whose work focuses on race in education and racial identity development in teenagers
Additional resources
Suggested instructions: Additional resources are provided as supporting instructional aids for teachers to use in class.
Fact Sheet
- Murchison, G. (n.d.). Understanding ethnic-racial identity development [Fact sheet]. https://umana-taylorlab.gse.harvard.edu/files/gse-umana-taylorlab/files/murchison_eri_fact_sheet.pdfopens in new window
This fact sheet, developed by the population health scientist Dr. Gabriel Murchison, provides an overview of ethnic-racial identity development. This document highlights the fact that all youth have an ethnic-racial identity and that there are benefits to exploring and coming to some conclusions about it. This is one of many resources available at Dr. Umaña-Taylor’s research lab at Harvard University. Dr. Umaña-Taylor developed the Identity Project, a school-based curriculum that engages adolescents in the developmental processes of ethnic-rational identity exploration and resolution.
Video
- “Because I’m Latino, I can’t have money?”. Kids on Race (2015, July 7). Being 12: The Year Everything Changes [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C6xSyRJqIe8opens in new window
This video is part of a broader series from New York Public Radio (WNYC) called Being 12: The Year Everything Changesopens in new window , which addresses cognitive, social, and emotional changes that happen around this age as they move into the formal operational stage and undergo puberty. This particular video focuses on conversations with middle schoolers discussing their viewpoints of their racial identity.
The development of resources to broaden diversity and representation in the teaching of high school psychology resources is an APA Committee of Teachers of Psychology in Secondary Schools initiative supported by funding from the American Psychological Foundation David and Carol Myers Fund. This resource was developed by Eric Castro, Shawn C.T. Jones, PhD, Allyn Olsen, and Catherine Sanderson, PhD.
Date created: August 2023