Social Forces, Social Justice, and School Attendance Problems in Youth

A growing body of research identifies the harmful effects that adverse childhood experiences (ACEs; occurring during childhood or adolescence; eg, child maltreatment or exposure to domestic violence) have on health throughout life. Studies have quantified such effects for individual ACEs. However, ACEs frequently co-occur and no synthesis of findings from studies measuring the effect of multiple ACE types has been done.

This meta-analytic study systematically investigates the relations between perceived racial/ethnic discrimination and socioemotional distress, academics, and risky health behaviors during adolescence and potential variation in these relations. The study included 214 peer-reviewed articles, theses, and dissertations with 489 unique effect sizes on 91,338 unique adolescents. Random-effects meta-analyses across 11 separate indicators of well-being identified significant detrimental effects. Greater perceptions of racial/ethnic discrimination were linked to more depressive and internalizing symptoms, greater psychological distress, poorer self-esteem, lower academic achievement and engagement, less academic motivation, greater engagement in externalizing behaviors, risky sexual behaviors, and substance use, and more associations with deviant peers. Meta-regression and subgroup analyses indicated differences by race/ethnicity, gender-by-race/ethnicity interactions, developmental stage, timing of retrospective measurement of discrimination, and country. Overall, this study highlights the pernicious effects of racial/ethnic discrimination for adolescents across developmental domains and suggests who is potentially at greater risk.