New study: biracial asian-americans are more likely to be sad
by Special Correspondent Thea Lim
Do you remember last last week’s Freakonomics study that claimed biracial black/white kids were liable to be twice as messed up as kids who were monoracially black or white?Apart from the racist generalisations of that study, some of our readers (including myself) were peeved at the insinuation that the only kind of biraciality that exists is the black/white kind. But good news everybody: there’s now a study for Asian/white biracials too!
Biracial Asian-Americans are twice as likely as monoracial Asian-Americans to be diagnosed with a psychological disorder, U.S. researchers said.
At first glance, this study seems to be treading the same problematic lines as the Freakonomics study. Like, call us crazy (haha!), but us biracial Asian Americans don’t like being told by a researchers that we’re twice as likely to be bananas as our monoracial Asian friends and relatives.
But take a closer look:
Among the biracial individuals in their national survey the researchers found 34 percent had been diagnosed with a psychological disorder — such as anxiety, depression or substance abuse — compared to 17 percent of monoracial individuals.
Considering that many biracial folk from a wee age have to put up with a lot of nonsense from families, both communities of colour AND white folk, and just society in general, it doesn’t surprise me if researchers find we experience higher levels of unhappiness.
If you ask me, there are two problems with the way this study has been described. One has to do with the way we talk about mental health, and the other has to do with confusing nature with nurture.
One:
Calling anxiety, depression and substance abuse “mental disorders” medicalises or pathologises these behaviours. In other words, it makes them sound like diseases, like derivations from healthy human behaviour. But any adult (and many kids) know that’s poppycock. Many people just feel worried, sad, or drink because life is difficult. Having that reaction is not necessarily a mental disorder.
I do believe that things like generalised anxiety disorder, major depression, and substance abuse problems exist. But it’s hard to tell how these things were diagnosed for the purposes of this study. Were all the biracial Asian Americans they spoke with struggling with serious, life-long or endogenous cases of mental disorder, or were they just having a hard time? I have found that these days we’re much quicker than we should be to label the bad day blues a sign of madness.
If you’ve ever looked at one of those Depression checklists (you see them in newspapers, doctor’s offices, on the internet), you can see right away that some of the questions are a little, well, odd. They usually ask things like: “Ever had a period of 2 weeks or more where everyday you felt blue?” Come now, who hasn’t experienced a 2 week period where they felt like poop? Especially someone dealing with confusion over their identity, feelings of unbelonging, or daily racism?
I’m not saying categorically that the study didn’t use an accurate test of mental disorder. And I’m also definitely saying that I understand violent sadness can sometimes be diagnosed as a disorder. But it’s just that it would behoove us to be a bit skeptical that anxiety, depression and substance abuse observed by the study all formed Mental Disorders.
Two:
Now, this study (or at least as it has been described) makes it sound as having “mixed blood” (yick) is what causes distress. That if you have a one white parent and one Asian parent, hey presto! Genetically you will probably be mad. This suggests that the problem, ie mentally disordered behaviour, is inherent to biracial folk.
In the snapshot way the study has been described, nurture isn’t explicitly recognised. It’s not suggested that the source of those behaviours could originate elsewhere (ie an f-ed up society), and that these so-called mental disorders could simply be a response to a bad situation, rather than a congenital problem.
You could argue that the problem isn’t the study, but the media’s depiction of it. I would say yes - but at the same time it is the researchers’ responsibility to ensure their press releases emphasise all the important info - like the possible fact that culture and not just genetics is a culprit.
It took me a while to figure out that what I disliked was not being mixed race, but being mixed race in a racist culture that fetishises or misunderstands the mixed race experience. What I mean is, the problem isn’t me and my mixed race self, it’s the culture I live in.
It was actually a disability activist who helped me to understand this difference. She has a mobility disability and she commented that what she disliked was not being disabled - that was a part of her identity and experience that made her, her - but being disabled within a culture and infrastructure that ignored her right to her basic needs.
I don’t mind the suggestion that mixed race people might have a hard time. Hey, it’s true! This study, if couched in different terms, could actually be helpful and validating to communities of biracial Asian Americans who struggle with their position in a race-obsessed society.
What I mind is the suggestion that mixed race people are innately defective. This kind of conversation that mislocates the problem in the person of colour rather than the society is what creates self-hatred. This is why it’s so heartbreaking when, for eg, East Asian men or Black women talk about how they see themselves as impossibly ugly. We’re hoodwinked into thinking that we’re the ones who are bad and gross, instead of the culture we live in.
But then again, you can’t trust me. Statistically I’m a loonie.
Sidebar: Let’s also note that defining “biracial” as half-white and half-something else is not accurate! Like you could be half Pakistani and half Malaysian. You’d still be biracial! Let’s stop ignoring the experiences of people who are mixed race but have two parents of colour. Doing otherwise makes it seem like the mixed race experience is only remarkable when a white person is involved - it insists white experiences be included.
Carmen Van Kerckhove is co-founder and president of 
Celeste wrote:
@Thea: Great post and I looooove that you put Lt. Torres up there! She was called a “mongrel child” in one episode and then her Klingon and human halves were seperated and got to have a conversation with each other on another. Spock didn’t seem to have nearly as much trouble.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 7:36 am ¶
justin wrote:
If the survey is based on the response of 125 individuals and 34% have been diagnosed with a psychological disorder does that mean that 42.5 people actually gave the response they wanted, and then what did they do with the other .5 of that body?
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 8:03 am ¶
Torontonian wrote:
Nowhere in the article does it suggest this. When I first read the article, I didn’t get this impression at all. Then again, I regularly read psychology news and have some psych background, so I may not be the general audience.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 8:21 am ¶
Torontonian wrote:
Even in the article you linked, it says,
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 8:23 am ¶
dave wrote:
Hi Thea,
Glad for this post, but I need to stick up for mental health diagnoses: the reason they have vague questions like the “two week blue period” is because by the very nature of the brain/behaviour/etc “mood disorders” as some of these are called require the symptoms to be more abstract in nature than “tumour=cancer”. And most mental health professionals do not, as a standard, want to overdiagnose someone with a depressive EPISODE as having had a depressive DISORDER. just more work for them.
And yeah, its worth pointing out that some “bad days” are just that, but having a literal string of bad days (and when they say “two weeks of feeling blue” they don’t mean like post-breakup feeling crap for two weeks, they often mean you can barely get out of bed and have a sense of crushing inertia).
My question for this study would involve reporting … if the “monoracial” Asian people that were interviewed were first gen/second gen, its been shown that culturally, many folks would rather not bring shame to family by admitting to mental disorders and historically under report symptoms. The underreporting is worse when the only people doing the interviewing are english language speakers.
So just to throw a wrench in there, I’d put out an idle hypothesis that the introduction of another culture may correlate to willingness to report symptoms. I think you need to defend that before you claim that biracial asian folks are 15% more likely to have mental illness.
Oh also, I’d want to know what other “half” the biracial Asian folks had, and what the percentage occurrence of mental illnesses were in that population. Because what if really the biracial folks were 15% BELOW the average for their other ethnicity and it was the Asian half that was making them less ill?
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 8:36 am ¶
Anomie wrote:
I’m not a psychologist; rather, I’m a sociologist by trade. However, I’m going to make a few guesses of my own here based on my experience as a social scientist:
1. “You could argue that the problem isn’t the study, but the media’s depiction of it. I would say yes - but at the same time it is the researchers’ responsibility to ensure their press releases emphasise all the important info - like the possible fact that culture and not just genetics is a culprit.”
This was a paper presented at an academic conference. I doubt there was a press release at all. Sometimes these articles get written up without the media even contacting the researchers.
2. I also imagine that if these academics’ research is being inaccurately described, the researchers are just as unhappy as you are about it. Or, more likely, they’re so numbed to the experience of being misrepresented that they can’t even muster up the energy to care. You really can’t blame the victim for this type of reporting. The media has a tendency to simplify incredibly complex academic research to suit their needs. They quote dig and lead the interviewee to get the story they want. Then they just leave out the stuff they consider irrelevant or doesn’t fit with what they want to present.
2. What experience I do have with psychology (a few classes here and there) leads me to believe that the researchers were by no means implicating biology in this study. As a matter of fact, when I read the report, I immediately wondered what psychological theories they had to explain this finding (seeing as how it was a psych study) and was frustrated with the lack of explanation on that regard. However, I imagine that this was addressed in the APA conference presentation.
3. “Like, call us crazy (haha!), but us biracial Asian Americans don’t like being told by a researchers that we’re twice as likely to be bananas as our monoracial Asian friends and relatives.
This makes it sound as though you are suggesting social scientists shouldn’t report unsavory findings. Am I interpreting that statement correctly?
4. This particular study has a pretty small sample size, which is probably why it was merely a conference paper. Such presentations are often just works in progress, or indications that a more systematic and in-depth study is merited. Conference papers are hardly the holy grail of academic research, and any findings from them should be interpreted within this in mind.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 8:42 am ¶
Lyonside wrote:
Oh God, all this is making my head hurt - I’m feeling all confused and mentally unbalanced and… and… tragic!!
———————-
OK, off topic, but also on: Years ago, I was making a passionate argument about how the Star Trek universe treats its mixed alien/human characters, and what that said about the writers’ American (mostly) biases towards mixed race humans (since anyone honest will tell you that species = race in STverse). I remember listing every one I could recall, by character assignation and my interpretation of what it meant (and yes, Worf is the TRA).
And as far as I could ever discern, if someone was 1/2 human and 1/2 “other”, that “human” parent was a pale one, of presumedly mostly- European ancestry (even in the 24th century, people - sheesh). Now hefty part of that is central casting, and the tendency for sci-fi in general to cast minorities as aliens, with the default humans being overwhelmingly white.
Which is all too similar to the way mixed epople are discussed and studied: people with one “white” parent and one “other” parent.
And we’re supposed to think that these “studies” aren’t biased? Yeah, right…
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 8:57 am ¶
Yvette wrote:
Not necessarily disagreeing with your post, but the mainstream press is notoriously deficient in accurately describing the details and nuances of academic research. Further information on the National Latino and Asian American Study (NLAAS) can be found at the following website: http://www.multiculturalmentalhealth.org/nlaas.asp
Included are links to study details, including complete questionnaire items and list of publications in academic journals.
Finally, w/r/t/ the issue of “nature vs nurture,” knowing the reputation of the researchers involved in the study I seriously doubt that they do not recognize the likely impact of environmental factors associated with their findings. In fact, the UPI article includes the following quote from Nolan Zane:
“We cannot underestimate the importance of understanding the social, psychological and experiential differences that may increase the likelihood of psychological disorders among this fast-growing segment of the population.”
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 9:01 am ¶
Julienne wrote:
I am a long time reader of Racialicious, but this is my first post. I was thrilled to see a post regarding mental health and people of color—even more exciting with Asian Americans. I currently work as a post-baccalaureate research fellow on psychological research on depression in a lab that works cross-culturally with labs from all over the world (a few in South America, a couple in Africa, and some in East Asia). I am so interested in the topic that I’m even in the process of applying to graduate school so that I can focus on research regarding Asian Americans and mental health. Interestingly enough, I have followed recent research pertaining to Asian Americans and mental health and have read past studies and projects of the researcher, Nolan Zane, who was involved with the study that you are citing.
I’m so excited to have this chance to have a discussion about this because I would love to read other’s input as well as share my own.
“Calling anxiety, depression and substance abuse “mental disorders” medicalises or pathologises these behaviours. In other words, it makes them sound like diseases, like derivations from healthy human behaviour. But any adult (and many kids) know that’s poppycock. Many people just feel worried, sad, or drink because life is difficult. Having that reaction is not necessarily a mental disorder.”
I feel that this is a popular viewpoint among mainstream America, and I can see why since the mental health topics that arise on television and in the newspaper are those that involve Dr. Phil, Britney Spears and Lindsey Lohan. Clinical depression is more than just “bad day blues.” Major depression and diagnosed general anxiety are debilitating and affect a person’s ability to function and perform daily living tasks. I believe that diagnosed psychological disorders, such as clinical depression and anxiety disorders, are just as bad as medical diseases. Mental health is just as important as physical health, and I don’t believe society puts enough emphasis on the importance on being healthy both mentally and physically.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 9:12 am ¶
Cynthia wrote:
Re #5 (dave):
Also, we need to note whether the Asian side is immigrant or western born/raised. Perhaps the same would be for the non-Asian side - For example, would there be a difference between, say, a Polish-Chinese mix (with both sets of parents from outside North America) compared with fifth generation Irish-American/immigrant Korean parentage or when both sides of the family were raised in North America?
I’d argue that monoracial second gens have MAJOR issues too, especially with cultural conflict with the parents.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 9:13 am ¶
Anomie wrote:
Much of the reason these mixed-race studies only focus on white and an “other” is because of available data. It’s hard to find sufficient data to study any other group or mixes. Plus, even if there were enough data, you wouldn’t look at more than one type of biracial group in a study, because the social implications of being half White half Asian are going to be different than being half White half Black, and I honestly don’t know if there’s enough data anywhere to study half Black half Asian, or any other potential mix out there. Of course these labels are grossly simplified, but the outcomes of being labeled this is based on society’s tendency to grossly simplify, so you would only study the groupings/ labellings that made for salient outcomes.
@Lyonside: Response to your aside: OOH OOH! I have a friend who actually did a sociological study on racial representation in Star Wars!!! And she did find much of those same things. It was entitled “’Westernizing’ the Galaxy: Klingon ‘Otherness’ as Affirming Human Superiority in Star Trek: The Next Generation” and argued that “the human species as portrayed in Star Trek represents the hegemonic voice of White America, a representation of the natural and normal to which other species, specifically the aggressive Klingons, are contrasted and viewed as inferior.”
Why can’t those sorts of conference presentations make the news? But then, with the way such academic work tends to get grossly simplified and misrepresented by the media, perhaps it’s best that it didn’t.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 9:19 am ¶
Phrone wrote:
My mother does work with Arab-Americans and substance abuse, and in general higher level of assimilation (measured, albeit imperfectly, by fluency in English and years in the United States) generally tend to correlate to higher levels of substance abuse. Now, I don’t know if anyone has done a similar study with Asian-Americans, but similar patterns could exist with that community as well. So I’m wondering whether the individuals chosen all had similar levels of assimilation — like dave has said as well, that could skew the results.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 9:24 am ¶
brad wrote:
To be blunt, I think this post was sloppy, reactionary, and very poorly thought out. Let’s look at the two primary criticisms:
1) Definitions of medical disorders. Obviously, this study was working with generally accepted definitions of these things… if you object to substance abuse being categorized as a mental disorder (which is a completely fair objection), then you should take up a broader debate with the entire field of psychology, not with one puny little study. The study itself doesn’t define these terms… they were just asking questions and crunching numbers.
2) Nature vs Nurture. As other comments have pointed out (#4, #8), the article directly refutes your accusation.
I feel like you started with the assumption that a study about the biracial experience must be somehow racist, and then tried to force the article to confirm to your assumption. The actual study, though, seems to be pretty run-of-the-mill and completely un-provocative.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 10:04 am ¶
Celeste wrote:
@Anomie: Where can I find your friend’s paper?!! I could go on for pages on that topic.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 10:09 am ¶
Ike wrote:
I thought Asian Americans already had a higher rate of depression than white Americans.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 10:16 am ¶
Thea Lim wrote:
@ Torontonian, Anomie, Julienne, Yvette:
I did read the whole article (it wasn’t very long!) and noticed the passage about
“We cannot underestimate the importance of understanding the social, psychological and experiential differences that may increase the likelihood of psychological disorders”
I also did notice that they weren’t saying “genetically, biracial Asian Americans are going to be crazy.” It was rather the way the study was described - without much info - that made me concerned that it could be interpreted as such.
Many of you mention having backgrounds or experience in psychology or sociology. That possibly makes you more able to grasp the nuances of a study like this. However when the headline “biracial Asian Americans twice as likely to be mentally disordered” hits the stands (or just Google, really) I would argue that what people take away is a correlation between ethnic background and mental disorders - rather than a correlation between experience and mental health.
The article actually came to me via an enraged chain of emails from the Racialicious team. We all read the rather skimpy article and most of the team was pretty pissed off by the study. It was only after I read the article a few times that I began to see a lot of value in the study.
I hope that point was made clear in my post - that I did think the study had value. It was more the way it was presented that troubled me - it makes it too easy for people to deduce that biraciality is some sort of mental defect.
@ Anomie:
“This makes it sound as though you are suggesting social scientists shouldn’t report unsavory findings. Am I interpreting that statement correctly?”
Oh no! As I said in my original post, I think the study has value, in that it validates an experience of distress, and I also think it could help families embarking on the biracial experience recognise that it’s tricky terrain.
What I do believe is that when scientists report findings about behaviours of “marginalised” groups, they should be really careful about how their info is released to the public. Something that’s totally intended to shed light on a complicated experience (as I think this study is) can be very quickly spun into something that simply reinforces dehumanising stereotypes.
@brad:
I didn’t think the study was racist. I wouldn’t have taken the time to write it up if I thought it was straight-up racist drivel.
@Julienne and brad:
I tried to make it clear in my post that I do believe major depression, generalised anxiety disorder and substance abuse are disabilities. I was more concerned that a clear difference be made between those conditions, and the bad day blues, feeling worried or stressed, and drinking too much from time to time. I do think that GAD, major depression and substance abuse are overdiagnosed in our culture (at least in my immediate experience). I do also believe (and have seen) that they are real conditions , and just like having a serious chronic illness.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 10:34 am ¶
Anomie wrote:
@Celeste: Sadly, the paper was a conference presentation and is not yet published. However, she drew heavily on Hall’s The Spectacle of the Other
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 10:43 am ¶
Thea Lim wrote:
@ Julienne & Phrone:
You might be interested in more of Nolan Zane’s research (he’s the psychologist who did the biracial Asian American study) - he does a lot of work in Asian American psychology:
http://psychology.ucdavis.edu/faculty/Zane/
http://asa.ucdavis.edu/faculty_zane.shtml
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 10:49 am ¶
Anomie wrote:
@Thea Lim: Thanks for the clarification. My original reading of your post was that it was ranting against “DAMN ACADEMICS,” rather than “DAMN MEDIA’S MISLEADING PRESENTATION OF ACADEMIC FINDINGS.”
You said that “We all read the rather skimpy article and most of the team was pretty pissed off by the study. It was only after I read the article a few times that I began to see a lot of value in the study.”
As I said, academics have no control over the media and it’s not feasible to “be really careful about how [our] info is released to the public. ” The media don’t exactly send us a preview of the articles about our work before publishing them. As such, I think it is especially important to emphasize that distinction between the study and the media’s report of it.
The places to direct the anger, in my opinion, would be at the media’s insufficient presentation of this research, academia’s tendency to lock research behind walls which make it hard for the general public to get a hold of original studies, and the tendency for the public to assume there is no intervening variable between race and mental health (i.e., there is something fundamentally different about the mental health leanings based on mere biology).
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 11:15 am ¶
Thea Lim wrote:
@ Anomie
I work for a research organization and all the research we do is disseminated through press releases, which is why I assumed the researchers had some control.
I see what you’re saying, and I did attempt in my original post to show that it wasn’t the study I was taking issue with really, but more the way it was described.
It does seem strange to me that psychologists would chose to study something assumedly in order to provide new info for the public - but then not go out of their way to couch their research in more nuanced terms. In terms of the way the public receives the info, the inaccurate way the research is released seems to almost undo any good that would come from the study in the first place.
I do agree that it is a multi-blame issue. I’m just surprised that - considering how much of a difference the way research is explained makes to the lay person - more work doesn’t go into making intentions and conclusions clear.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 11:33 am ¶
anon wrote:
I’m a biracial Asian-Am male who has been struggling with varying levels of depression my whole life, so that study really hit a nerve with me.
My father is a white man with a preference for Asian women; my mother is an Asian woman with a preference for white men. Now I love my parents, and we’re quite close. But the fact remains that their biases have caused deep damage to my self-esteem, which at the age of 30 I’m only now starting to discover and address.
Looking back at my childhood, I now see how they sent me the message–in subtle and not so subtle ways–that I was different and unattractive. They didn’t meant to do that; they were unaware of the effects of their words.
Also, I grew up in a racist town, and my parents were ill-equipped to guide me and help me deal with it. And so I was left alone to deal with my racial issues–identity, internalized racism, external racism, etc.
Anyway, I don’t know how common my experience was, but I can see how biracial Asian-Ams can have higher incidence of depression, anxiety, etc.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 11:43 am ¶
Monie wrote:
Any study based on race and not culture is faulty. There is only one race of humans; why is this so hard for people to understand?!
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 11:54 am ¶
m wrote:
what about the blasians?!
(we’re the invisible group caughtbetween the black/white biracials and asian/white biracials, often left out of these discussions.)
what about other non-caucasian mixed people and those who are of latino heritage?
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 11:56 am ¶
Alyssa wrote:
The fault defiantly seems to be with the media here. This article is so short that it really doesn’t tell us anything. It says: “researchers based their study on information from the 2002 to 2003 National Latino and Asian-American Study.” What does this mean? Did they not even talk to these people that they are gathering information about? If they are just looking at numbers on paper instead of actually interviewing people, why is the sample size only 125 people? Why were only Asian-Caucasian people included in the study? If it was for accuracy, why were 4 different types of Asian-Caucasians studied indiscriminately? It also says: “researchers controlled for differences between the groups in age, gender and life stress among other factors.” Once again, what does this mean? Life stress, other factors? This can mean anything. And how do they control for this? I’m sure there are good answers to these questions, but without the actual study, I have no clue to what was actually being studied.
Even more interesting is the title. The title really does scream don’t marry that Asian / white person or your mixed kids will be screwed up. An easy fix would be to do something like this other title “Body image obsession takes toll on women” (in the most popular list). In this title, the problem is clearly “body image obsession”, not women.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 12:07 pm ¶
Yuhei wrote:
Frankly, I’m disappointed in this article (Thea Lim’s, not the UPI story). While I was among the many Racialicious readers that thought the Freakonomics article on Black-White mixed people was a lot of vague BS, I can’t say the same today.
I would like to address the two arguments that Lim makes, as I believe both are deeply flawed. The first argument is that anxiety or depression is a natural part of life, and that calling them “mental disorders” disregards this fact, turning an appropriate reaction to a genuinely sad or depressing event into an improper diagnosis. While this is not necessarily an invalid point, there is no evidence that either the article or the study it cites are guilty of overdiagnosing minor mental heath problems as serious mental disorders. Lim’s argument is thus weakened by the absence of a clear example of the kind of overdiagnoses she rails against. It seems to me that Lim is assuming that the authors of this study are guilty until proven innocent because that better fits the point she wants to make.
The second argument Lim makes is that either the study or the UPI article describing it implies that mixed heritage is the sole cause of a person’s mental problems, rather than any life experiences (such as discrimination) which may also be a factor. As Torontonian already pointed out, in the UPI story the researcher Nolan Zane specifically states that “We cannot underestimate the importance of understanding the social, psychological and experiential differences that may increase the likelihood of psychological disorders among this fast-growing segment of the population” - a statement which directly contradicts Lim’s argument. The UPI article’s headline simply states that “Asian-Caucasians face mental disorder risk”, and the body of the article is similarly dry; nothing about “mixed blood” being the cause, unless the definition of the word “risk” has changed since I learned it. The only person I see making that assumption is Lim herself.
I am an Asian-Caucasian mix just like the article discusses. I have three sisters, and all three have severe cases of bipolar depression - severe enough to warrant multiple hospital stays for each. This is not a case of the “bad day blues” or a doctor making mountains out of molehills. Bipolar disorder is a group of serious mental disorders with a hereditary component. Is it so unreasonable to see a mixed race family with three bipolar children out of four and wonder if the Asian-Caucasian mix is a factor?
I think Thea Lim does my sisters a disservice with this article. While the concept of “race” is largely a social construct, it is a biological reality that some diseases impact some racial communities more than others. The general tone of Lim’s article emphasizes the first half of that statement while downplaying the second. Making assumptions about a person’s intelligence or personality based on their race/ethnicity is foolish, but the same cannot be said for their biology. Fair skinned people are at a greater risk of developing skin cancer through overexposure to the sun. People of African descent are at a greater risk for sickle cell anemia. Neither statement implies that ONLY those two groups have these problems, or that being fair skinned or African is the sole cause of these conditions - but they are factor.
While “nurture” factors like discrimination can’t be discounted in a mental health diagnosis, neither can “nature” factors like a person’s heritage. Lim’s mistake is making the assumption that the article overemphasizes the role of “nature” (clearly, it doesn’t) - then, she makes the case that “nurture” is the true cause of depression, anxiety and other mental disorders. The truth is that nature and nurture are two sides of the same coin - you can’t have one without the other, and in most medical situations both are a factor.
After reading her article, it seems to me that Lim would like to live in a world where all people are dealt the exact same hand of cards. This is absolutely appropriate in regard to the law, the workplace, and other social environments, but completely inappropriate in regard to medicine, which must address biological realities in order to work properly. And the biological reality is that no one is dealt the same hand of cards, and that groups of people of similar ancestry will have many medical problems in common. Shoehorning an argument appropriate to a social situation into a discussion about a medical situation in order to prove yourself right is making a straw man argument.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 12:13 pm ¶
C-Marsh wrote:
“I do believe that things like generalised anxiety disorder, major depression, and substance abuse problems exist. But it’s hard to tell how these things were diagnosed for the purposes of this study. Were all the biracial Asian Americans they spoke with struggling with serious, life-long or endogenous cases of mental disorder, or were they just having a hard time?”
First I would like to say thanks Thea for the post. I think that this post in relation to the Freakanomics post keeps us all honest. I’ve had to really think about my gut reactions to this post in tandem with my reaction to the Freakanomics post to see if I critiqued these studies with equal level of scrutiny.
I have to say that I disagree with this post. I don’t think that the researcher is implicating that “mixed blood” is the cause for mental disorders nor is he diagnosing normal human emotion as a psychological disorder. I think that those of us with psychology training understand some things that most people do not when reading a psychology specific study.
1. In regard to mental disorders, Psychologist use criteria established by the DSM
2. As a given, Psychologist should avoid implicating a definite cause and effect relationship
3. Psychologist typically present with the assumption that their audience will be attune to common psych lingo and general practice; however, in actual studies the methods and procedures usually spell out specific scales and measures that were used.
I give most psychologists the benefit of the doubt and assume that they follow these rules, especially some one like Nolan Zane. I must say that it is difficult to say that he did this without seeing the actual article, but he is one that I would give the benefit of the doubt. From the Health News link, it seemed apparent that Dr. Zane attempted to use qualifying statements that did not undermine social factors. Furthermore, the article quotes data directly from the study showing its relevance only to the sample, but implicating that future study could make the results more generalizable. I would argue that the article written about the study can be portrayed as attempting to make the results of this study generalizable to a wider population, but there is a difference between this article and the Freakanomics one. On his blog, Levitt attempts to establish a cause-effect relationship from his data. Furthermore, the study itself used dated and flawed theories to prove the researchers hypothesis. Judging strictly from the Health News article, I cannot say that Dr. Zane implicates a causal relationship.
On the other hand, because I am not a trained economist, I cannot say that Levitt did not present his study with the impression that mostly other economists would consult it. I can say that Levitt definitely stepped out of the realm of discipline without having a multidisciplinary team approach, which is why his study faltered.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 12:27 pm ¶
C-Marsh wrote:
Sorry. Should read
“I can say that Levitt definitely stepped out of the realm of *his* discipline…”
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 12:40 pm ¶
Fatemeh wrote:
Great post, Thea! You kick ass, as always. You have the official endorsement of a bi-racial lady like myself!
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 12:41 pm ¶
Torontonian wrote:
Now that it’s pointed out to me, it makes sense that most people would interpret it that way, since people generally make the fundamental attribution error.
Psychologists are not doing research to provide new information for the public. They are doing research to provide new information for other psychologists and academics.
The article itself also does not seem to be written for the general public, but for people who have a background in psychology. The kinds of science articles written for the general public are usually editorials in newspapers that include the writer’s personal anecdotes as concrete examples and other unnecessary information. I don’t think the article itself was that bad, in that it’s not the case that an editorial writer extrapolated from the study and added unnecessary speculation. However, I wasn’t aware that many people who don’t follow psychology news would read this.
From reading only the article, however, it looks like the researchers did not control for place of birth, and studies about Asians that don’t control for this really annoy me, as there are huge differences between the identities of foreign-born versus native-born Asians. To me, controlling for place of birth is more important than controlling for age and gender, in this context. However, the article makes no mention of this, and apparently, there is no paper for me to find out if place of birth was controlled for.
Anyway, how should we deal with psychology studies being misinterpreted by the general public? Is it a matter of educating high school students about how to read psychology studies and papers? I don’t think adding disclaimers about how differences do not mean a genetic cause to every psychology article is a viable solution…
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 12:46 pm ¶
thesciencegirl wrote:
I haven’t had a chance to read the paper yet, but I will say this: mainstream media depictions of scientific studies are generally horrendously inaccurate and misleading.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 12:46 pm ¶
Julienne wrote:
Here is the abstract for the actual study. It’s not the complete paper, but at least it goes into greater detail.
http://forms.apa.org/convention/viewabstract.cfm?id=63086
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 1:26 pm ¶
C-Marsh wrote:
Thanks Julienne!
I think this abstract can clear up a lot.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 1:34 pm ¶
Torontonian wrote:
Thanks for the abstract, Julienne. It looks like place of birth was not controlled for, again.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 1:59 pm ¶
Yvette wrote:
Thea, thank you for providing more context for your reaction to the study. Yes, unfortunately it really is the case that–as thesciencegirl states–mainstream media does not do a good job of presenting academic research. Increasingly in journalism programs there are courses and whole specialization tracks devoted to science reporting. But my fear is that as newsrooms trim their “fat” to stay competitive, dedicated science reporting will fall victim to cuts.
Also, increasingly academics are being trained in graduate school to more effectively translate their own findings for the general public. In my opinion this is also hit and miss, as there are no rewards for folks in academia who write well for “the public.” No one, as far as I know, has ever received tenure for their great press releases to UPI or AP or People magazine! LOL
Someone asked what can be done? I think specifically as people interested in anti-racist topics we need to take the responsibility to educate ourselves. For example, there are some excellent popular, mainstream books about statistics and “numeracy” that can help in the understanding of basic statistics reported in journals. Also, many research teams these days have their own web sites where additional information about their studies can be found.
Finally, I know that many are–rightly–sensitive about the portrayals of mixed race people, people of color, and other marginalized groups with regard to mental health. But as bad as it is to say “Oh, those groups have problems” is the *ignoring* of their mental health needs. This continues to be an issue in counseling, family, child and other psychology clinical programs across the country. My sense is that articles such as these might highlight the need for the mental health community to attend to these needs.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 2:04 pm ¶
C-Marsh wrote:
@ Torontonian
Great comments! I definitely would like to see a study control for place of birth, but I think they are in the works and will hopefully be out in the next decade. Integrating place of birth, cultural influences, and cultural identity is definitely something that I hope to see more of in psych.
Funny enough, I think you inadvertently illustrated your point with mention of the Fundamental Attribution Error (FAE). The FAE is quite ironic because other studies have found that the FAE is not as fundamental as we (Western Cultures) like to think. One study tested FAE in individualistic cultures vs. collectivistic cultures and found that FAE is a mainly a western phenomenon (don’t remember study name, title, or year. Sorry!)
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 2:06 pm ¶
Arturo wrote:
Wow, a lot to go through here, and I’ll do so as the day progresses. I did, however, want to ask: isn’t Roxann Dawson Latina? Or was B’Elanna identified as being Half-Asian, Half-Klingon?
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 2:06 pm ¶
Yvette wrote:
BTW, with regard to race and Star Trek, I think it is pretty dated by now but folks might be interested in the book “Star Trek and History: Race-ing Toward a White Future.” There is also a web site that details the race/nationality/species of Star Trek characters and the actors playing them that I saw a while back.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 2:08 pm ¶
Julienne wrote:
@ Alyssa
“‘Researchers based their study on information from the 2002 to 2003 National Latino and Asian-American Study.’ What does this mean?”
*When certain studies/projects are being done, they take A LOT of data. They might take data on various aspects of mental health, demographic information, different assessments that measure a multiple of things. Recruiting participants is a difficult process, so when they do have individuals willing to participate and help out, research teams try to use that opportunity to gather as much data as possible. When they say that they used information from the 2002-2003 Study, they probably mean that they used certain data and not EVERYTHING that was collected because not everything may be related.
“Did they not even talk to these people that they are gathering information about? If they are just looking at numbers on paper instead of actually interviewing people, why is the sample size only 125 people?”
*According to the NLASS (http://www.multiculturalmentalhealth.org/nlaas.asp#aims) study, the final NLASS sample had 2095 Asian American respondents. After seeing who qualifies out of that existing data for the current study and accounting for people who dropped out early, didn’t complete all of the necessary forms, etc., they were probably left with their sample of 125 biracial and 435 monoracial Asian Americans.
“Why were only Asian-Caucasian people included in the study?”
*This study is one of the first, if not the first of its kind that dealt with biracial individuals and mental health. (I know, ain’t it crazy that people are just now becoming interested in doing research to help multi-racial individuals when it comes to mental health?)
Asian-Caucasian individuals were probably the only type of people selected because 1) they already have data from Asian Americans and 2) if you look at more than one type of biracial individuals, then you run the risk of bringing in too many variables to the study. After this research is done, then further research can then look into other types of biracial individuals using the same type of method.
“‘Researchers controlled for differences between the groups in age, gender and life stress among other factors.’ Once again, what does this mean? Life stress, other factors? This can mean anything. And how do they control for this?”
*In the researchers’ abstract (http://forms.apa.org/convention/viewabstract.cfm?id=63086), they say that they used a statistical test (Logistic Regression Analyses) analyzing the information provided by the participants. There is a way to see how statistically significant a factor/variable is while taking into account other factors. I can’t really explain this test without writing a long boring explanation about statistics
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 2:13 pm ¶
Winn wrote:
Most other commenters have covered my major objections to this post, so thanks, guys! I especially concur with C-Marsh’s discussion of how the Freakonomics study differs from this one, particularly with respect to Levitt attempting to use economic data to establish causality between “race” and behavior. We would call that seriously stepping “outside your scope of practice”. I just wanted to add one element. I am a psychotherapist, and although theoretical orientations differ, I would venture to say that most mental health professionals (whether you are talking psychologists, psychiatrists, marriage and family therapists, licensed professional counselors, social workers, etc.) are encouraged, if they utilize DSM-IV diagnoses at all, to apply the least pathologizing and stigmatizing diagnosis possible to still address the patient/client’s mental health needs. Of course, this is not true in all individual cases, but as Yuhei points out, there is no evidence presented in the article or the study itself that suggests overdiagnosis or an exacerbation of symptomology by the researchers into a more severe and unwarranted pathology.
As a supporter of the National Alliance on Mental Illness, I am wary of the continued stigmatizing and marginalization of those with mental illness, which extends to protesting when there is even the suggestion of mental illness impacting a particular community or category of persons. There is so much shame and culture-bound tradition in many communities regarding mental illness, which stymies outreach, inhibits intervention, and sometimes contributes to either the entrenchment of or the denial of the sick role. If socio-cultural, environmental, and yes, biological issues are implicated in problematic psychological outcomes for a particular group, as a therapist operating from a muticultural and social justice paradigm, I want to know about it.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 2:19 pm ¶
Torontonian wrote:
@ C-Marsh:
I think I read about that, the FAE being mainly a Western phenomenon, in a social psychology textbook. However, since you mentioned the individualistic vs. collective distinction of Western versus Eastern societies, there was an interesting critique about (some of) these studies, linked by atlasien in a Racialicious comment: David Brooks, Social Psychologist. Basically, the studies are problematic. The first study is particularly amazing with respect to the contradiction between the data and the researchers’ conclusions.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 2:42 pm ¶
Lyonside wrote:
On with the lighthearted aspect of this (and yet, there are arguments to be made as to how our pop culture and associated subcultures deal with race and ethnicity, fictional and actual, and what it says about our daily life and culture…)
> isn’t Roxann Dawson Latina? Or was B’Elanna identified as being Half-Asian, Half-Klingon?
The actress is, and the character was identified as having a latinoor spanish human father (by name, at least - not sure if it ever was addressed directly - I was only a casual viewer of ST:Love Boat.)
But she was the “mixed” one, and the one who had 1) anger issues, 2) identity issues, and 3) emotional issues. Since that applies to the mental health issue of this study, I’m guessing that’s why it was chosen.
>“Star Trek and History: Race-ing Toward a White Future.”
And Yvette, it isn’t just a ST issue*. Socially conscious fans, whether POCs or not, in a lot of fandoms have sighed and grimaced over casting for a lot of sci-fi/alternative reality/future fantasy movies and TV for decades now, and we still watch… reluctently… And in creative fandom, it sometimes even gets addressed.
*Don’t get me started on Jason Momoa’s reported dreadlock battles with management, for crissakes.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 3:05 pm ¶
Alyssa wrote:
@Julienne:
Thank you so much for the abstract and explination. This actually clears up a lot for me. I really don’t have a problem with the study. It looks to be very useful and I would love to see a lot more of these done.
I do have a problem with the UPI article on it though. It seems that the article is mostly headline and very little substance. At the very least, the article could link to the abstract, which answers a lot of those burning questions.
@ Winn and the rest of you who have stated that there is a “continued stigmatizing and marginalization of those with mental illness,” I compleatly agree. Perhaps this is something for the contributers of this blog to remember. I know this blog is specific to race, so there really isn’t a place to talk about mental illness on this blog, but please remember that this is a group that is often discriminated against (up to and including the health care industry not providing proper care for mental illnesses). Perhaps we need a forum like this one that is dedicated to discussing the experiences of those affected by mental health, and how mental health is represented in our culture (there is a lot to be said just from Law and Order alone). If you all know of something like this (not NAMI, which I was very unhappy with my local chapter) please let me know.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 3:06 pm ¶
Latoya Peterson wrote:
@All -
We are going to do a post on the benefits and limitations of scientific research on race. This conversation clinches it as it appears the contributor conversation is operating from a different vantage point than what is in the comments.
@Alyssa -
Thank you for being respectful of the goals of the space here. That being said, as mental health and stigma affect people of color, it is entirely appropriate to bring up here.
The problem is how we go *about* covering this, which is difficult as we - contributors - are all coming from different places. There is a stunningly scary gap between the over diagnosis of certain mental health issues and the under diagnosis of others and a whole lot of personal experience is caught up in between.
I am still debating how to handle a larger discussion with viewpoints that are in disharmony. Perhaps a point, counterpoint…
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 3:27 pm ¶
C-Marsh wrote:
@ Torontonian
Touché. I too was just recalling this from social psych and I don’t think that I actually read the original studies. Thanks for the link!
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 3:30 pm ¶
em wrote:
@Latoya: i would be really interested in seeing you guys delve into psychology from a multi-racial/cultural perspective.
maybe it was just my crazy ap psych teacher in high school, but since then i’ve always had a definite aversion to that particular social “science” (sorry all psych people on here, again, i probably just don’t know enough about it).
i had to take a developmental psych class for my teaching certification in new york, and i remember this really interesting article that was very critical of developmental psychology. the main idea of the article was that this was a “science” created at the peak of a sexist, racist, classist, and euro-centric society. for better or worse, this article reinforced a lot of my admittedly superficial understandings about psychology.
so again, this is a topic i would be very interested in seeing played out, and i’d love to learn more
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 5:36 pm ¶
Arturo wrote:
Thanks, Lyonside. Now I can safely resume my half-joking call for Trek to introduce the Chingón (Chicano/Klingon) Empire into canon
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 5:38 pm ¶
Shaina wrote:
Wow. Thank you so much for your eye-opening blogs.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 6:38 pm ¶
CVT wrote:
Interesting. As both a BioPsych major and a biracial (Chinese/white) man, this is some fascinating stuff.
It’s funny, because I actually wanted to study something like this at some point, finding that a large number of mixed folks I knew seemed to tend more towards bipolar traits than other folks I know. I emphasize bipolar “traits” because I don’t think most would have been diagnosed as bipolar.
Of course, I don’t know how much of that was just me knowing them better and them being more likely to share those kinds of feelings with me, as opposed to actual experience.
Besides, bi-racial half-Asian is such a broad category that has so many variables, I don’t know if a study could ever really control for that. I imagine that the experiences of a half-Filipino are going to be quite different from a half-Japanese person. And then you take in degrees removed from immigration to the States, the other race involved (as others have said), economic status . . . whatever.
Just too much for me to put much store in this kind of study. I don’t mind the idea behind it - I just don’t know how much we can really extrapolate from it.
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 7:53 pm ¶
Roxie wrote:
O/T
I have wondered what you would think about MTV’s new “reality” show “Exile”
Where they send some of the spoiled kids from “Super Sweet Sixteen” and send them to remote place in the world FOR A WHOLE WEEK! To have them learn….something.
http://www.mtv.com/ontv/dyn/exiled/series.jhtml
Posted 25 Aug 2008 at 11:49 pm ¶
Charity wrote:
I’m Eurasian. I’m yellow and white. And reading the headline of your article on another blog caught my eye and made me click on it. And that’s how I’ve discovered your blog.
I read your whole article. Bravo! Really good!
Now all I can say, is, that article is probably just an attack of the jealous and boring uni-racial people of the world! ha ha ha! Because they know all Eurasians are drop-dead-gorgeous…they don’t know how else to get at us but to say “yeah they’re gorgeous but they’re crazy!” LOL
Hey, there are a lot of ugly crazies, you know! I’d rather be a drop-dead gorgeous crazy than just an ordinary everyday crazy! LOL!
Posted 26 Aug 2008 at 3:01 am ¶
lunanoire wrote:
anon,
I hope you are seeking help in your struggle. My mother has expressed general concern for the children of unions such as yours. If the subtly or overtly “best” pairing is of a mother from group X and a father from group Y, what happens when the children do not identify with the ethnic background of their parent of the same gender?
Posted 26 Aug 2008 at 2:23 pm ¶
j.k. wrote:
It’s difficult for me to respond to this post, but I feel like I must. It was even harder for me to read through the article and comments, because there were points where I thought to myself, “Great, I’m someone’s research guinea pig again.”
@ Monie: I can’t keep writing until I just comment to what you said: “Any study based on race and not culture is faulty. There is only one race of humans; why is this so hard for people to understand?!” — There is this thing called Colorblind Racism that YOU need to understand. Look it up. Tag, you’re it.
(This summer I’ve given up on trying to make white people feel comfortable when talking about racism. But, I digress.)
I think it’s important for folks to check themselves on the “But what about the [insert race] and [insert race] folks? What about their study?” Of course there are studies on other mixed folks–there are books/articles/etc on all sorts of mixed folks. We need to keep in mind that this article/study/research is about White/AsianAm folks.
My issue with this study is that it follows this post-Civil Rights Era rhetoric of putting race into boxes. “Well, if we take a Chinese person and a white person and they make a baby, will it be as fucked up in the head as the baby of two Chinese people living in the United States?” These sorts of studies intrigue and infuriate me.
On the one hand, it’s great for me to reaffirm (with science) that my depression can be “blamed” on my race.
Yet, that discredits all the experiences I have had as a human. Now, before you start saying, “Wait, you just called someone a colorblind racist, and now you’re saying that we’re all part of the human race? Isn’t that hypocritical?”
What I’m saying is that–how am I supposed to know that my depression isn’t because my friend committed suicide last year, or that I’ve been in fucked up relationships with rude men? I guess it’s a negotiation of it all… of the “human” experiences and the “racialized” experiences. But again, I don’t want to put my experiences into those boxes, because then I am falling victim to that which I am fighting against. These boxes, these boxes.
My depression is definitely affected by the fact that I’m a mixed race woman of color. If there are going to be scientific studies where people are put into separate boxes and studied, then let’s really separate those boxes.
Where does gender play in? What about queer identity(s)? Class background? Geographical location? Divorced/married status of parents? Private or public education?
If you’re gonna put me in a box to study me, at least make it specific to my laundry list of Other-ness.
Posted 26 Aug 2008 at 8:53 pm ¶
Nia wrote:
While I agree that the framing of this study pathologizes mixed race Asian Americans and that this is unacceptable, your attack of the criteria for what constitutes depression felt invalidating to me as someone who has struggled with it tremendously. Yes, psychologists profit from overdiagnosing “disorders” and overprescribing drugs, but some people have real problems and need real help. Your critique could be framed in a way more acknowledging of these people.
Posted 03 Sep 2008 at 2:45 am ¶
E wrote:
I just wrote an article about this study for my school newspaper:
http://www.theaggie.org/article/1301
I talked with one of the researchers as a source, and she did acknowledge that the press release generated a lot of controversy like what I’m seeing in this thread. Here are some points she explained to me that might help clarify some of the confusion here:
1. The rates of “mental disorders” for biracial Asian Americans in the study are no higher than for the general US population. In contrast, rates for monoracial Asian Americans tend to be lower.
2. Further analysis of the data set since the press release suggests that having lower ethnic identity is a risk factor for having “mental disorders.” Biracials in general tend to have lower ethnic identity than monoracials, and this was true for the group in the study.
3. I did not report this, but twice as many participants in the biracial group had a family history of “mental disorders” compared to the monoracial group (16% vs 8%). So family history may be another risk factor that explains the discrepancy.
4. The rates for specific “mental disorders” were very low across the board in the groups analyzed. The researchers lumped them all into one category variable to see a significant difference between the two groups.
I tried my best not to play into the stereotypical depiction of the “tragic biracial.” I chose not to mention that one of my sources attributed her teenage angst and depression to difficulty accepting her biracial identity (partly because I thought it too personal for a science article, even a half-arsed one). Yet, according to the researcher, there is some anecdotal evidence in the literature suggesting that conflict and confusion over ethnic identity could result in “negative psychological outcomes” for biracials (I didn’t dig deeper than that). Hope this helps
Posted 12 Sep 2008 at 5:09 am ¶
Lyonside wrote:
E: thanks for passing on your article. I’m glad you were able to talk to one of the researchers.
What your additional information says to me is the following:
>The rates of “mental disorders” for biracial Asian Americans in the study are no higher than for the general US population.
I wish this had been emphasized in the press release.
>Further analysis of the data set since the press release suggests that having lower ethnic identity is a risk factor for having “mental disorders.”
AND
>I chose not to mention that one of my sources attributed her teenage angst and depression to difficulty accepting her biracial identity
Well, as a lot of us have said, that’s not because of anything internal, so much as being constantly barraged by social expectations and stereotypes, a lack of positive portrayals of people like you in daily life, government leadership, peers, employers, and the pop culture. It’s draining, and puts you constantly on the defensive. That’s not exactly condusive to positive self image and mental health.
It’s like the infamous preschool blackdoll/white doll study with black children - were these kids independently self-hating, or were they reflecting the messages given them by society? Pretty much everyone agrees on the latter.
The danger with studies like this that have valid datasets but fail to really explain their findings in a way the popular press understands and cannot misinterpret, is that shoddy interpretations are used to justify all kinds of things.
BMI has been shown to be horribly inaccurate for a lot of people, but it still can determine whether you get life insurance you can afford.
Practical (mis)applications of this study? More scrutiny for mixed race people, esp. Asians, entering a field involving therapy, social work, or psychology. It could even be used to justify not hiring someone for education or child care.
I’m sure there’s more applications out there, just to make sure the confused tragic mulatto wont’ got postal on their boss. *eyeroll*
Posted 12 Sep 2008 at 8:10 am ¶
chinsta wrote:
I’m Chinese and Mexican. I wonder what they say about us folk.
Posted 19 Oct 2008 at 10:41 pm ¶