Ethnic socialization, identity development, and psychological adjustment in international adoptees as adolescents and young adults

Ethnic and racial socialization of internationally and/or transracially adopted children has been widely recognized as a viable and important social work practice area in the adoption community. Increasingly, adoption social work professionals and adoption agencies advocate for the importance of connecting children who have been adopted internationally and/or transracially to their birth culture. However, awareness of what constitutes good social work practice in this area is minimally informed by research evidence. The primary purpose of this study was to identify developmental contextual factors, such as adoptive parents' support of ethnic and racial socialization and neighborhood characteristics, and examine how such factors affect transracially adopted Asian children's ethnic identity development and psychological well-being. Using a web-based survey design, the study recruited 100 Asian adoptees, between the ages of 14-26 from adoption family support groups on various Internet e-mail "listservs". The results showed that while ethnic socialization was directly and negatively associated with adoptees' psychological well-being, the effect of racial socialization was positive. The finding suggests that parental efforts for socializing children to their ethnic culture facilitate adoptees' ethnic identity development, which in turn, decrease adoptees' sense of marginality and, thereby increase adoptees' self-esteem.