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<p>In the last several years, it has
become apparent that racial/ethnic minority graduate students face an increased
risk for mental health issues (Clark, Mercer, Zeigler-Hill, & Dufrene,
2012; Paradies et al., 2015). Contextualizing their experiences and determining
what factors play a role in increasing this risk specifically for racial/ethnic
minority graduate students could help provide information about areas for
intervention. However, there is a lack of literature on the experiences of
racial/ethnic minorities in graduate school and the implications of those
experiences for their mental health. It is important to understand their
experience in the context of minority status stress through the use of Stress
Process Theory (Pearlin, Menaghen, Lieberman, & Mullan, 1981). As such I
hypothesized several positive and unique contributions to depressive symptoms
by career and education barriers and minority status stress. Additionally, I
hypothesized that minority status stress would mediate the relationship between
career and education barriers and depressive symptoms, and that perceived
family social support would moderate the relationships between career and
education barriers, minority status stress, and depressive symptoms. To this
end I used this regression-based, quantitative study to examine the associations
between the perception of career and education barriers, minority status
stress, perceived family social support, and depressive symptoms among a sample
(<i>N</i> = 311) of domestic racial/ethnic
minority graduate students currently enrolled in degree granting programs. The
results revealed that the perception of career barriers uniquely contributed to
depressive symptoms, although not in the hypothesized direction with career
barriers being a negative predictor of depressive symptoms. Minority status
stress uniquely contributed to depressive symptoms in the hypothesized
directions and serves as a mediator between the perception of career barriers
and depressive symptoms. The perception of education barriers did not uniquely
contribute to depressive symptoms. Additionally, perceived family social
support moderated only the relationship between the perception of career
barriers and depressive symptoms; a moderator effect was not found in any other
relationship. Implications for future research and practice, as well as the study’s
limitations are discussed<b></b></p>
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Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:purdue.edu/oai:figshare.com:article/7408850 |
Date | 17 January 2019 |
Creators | Martin A. Nolasco (5930090) |
Source Sets | Purdue University |
Detected Language | English |
Type | Text, Thesis |
Rights | CC BY 4.0 |
Relation | https://figshare.com/articles/Depressive_Symptoms_and_The_Stress_Process_in_Racial_Ethnic_Minority_Graduate_Students/7408850 |
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