Having inter-ethnic friendships helps to mitigate racist and xenophobic attitudes in adolescents, although this effect is not strong enough to counteract parental influence on this same issue. This is the main conclusion of a study by the University of Lleida (ULL) based on the responses of 60,000 students from around the world to the PISA exam. In a somewhat forced way, it could be said that science has wondered if there is any truth behind the well-known cliché “I’m not racist, I have a black friend”. And even if it contains a (small) element of truth, it does not serve as an excuse to deny one’s own racism.
Studies have already been carried out on how the prejudices they receive from their environment affect adolescents, but professors Josep Ubalde, Fernando Senar and Cecilio Lapresta wanted to go further and try to know “to what extent this interethnic contact works” to reduce anti-immigration attitudes and what influence each group exerts on young people, according to Ubalde, head of the research.
And the result is that it has an effect. “Interethnic contact reduces anti-immigrant prejudice,” the researcher explains, “even if it is brief.” But the result is the same for all 11 countries analyzed, which makes the study more robust.
However, this knowledge can be used to “encourage educational policies such as mixed schools, to promote contacts within these schools and to generate more tolerant children with better attitudes towards immigrants”, asks the professor, at a time when, in the absence of data, racism and intolerance seem to be growing in classrooms, or at least, in a visible way.
“Adolescence is a key stage in the development of prejudices,” the report explains the importance of “understanding how these attitudes are formed to achieve more inclusive and cohesive future societies.”
Parents, school, environment
Adolescents receive influences from three different social groups, explains the professor from the Department of Psychology, Sociology and Work at ULL: from their parents, their friends and school, and from the broader social context, a concept that encompasses networks, communication media, the neighborhood and society in general. Influences that, when they arrive in the form of prejudices, can deeply penetrate young people. And although no group has more power of persuasion than another when it comes to transmitting their scruples, those that reach parents remain more fixed, the research affirms.
The study concludes that having “friendly contact” – and not just coexistence – “even if it reduces anti-immigrant attitudes, it is not able to break the prejudices inherited from parents or those received from school, but it can cut those from the broader context,” says Ubalde. The researcher gives an example: “If a teenager watches a video on YouTube with prejudiced attitudes, this chain of prejudices could be cut from interethnic friendships.” But having racialized friends will not be able to counteract the impact that a parent’s racism can have on that same young person.
“The characters who have the greatest impact on our formation as social beings are our parents, who from the first moment transmit messages, information to us, play a role as a model, an authority figure and an imitation. And that is very difficult to change, even for those who say: ‘I am very different from my parents’. Normally, no. They left you an important backpack, even if you don’t realize it,” explains Ubalde.
The researchers tried to measure how much the prejudices that parents may have impact their children. And from the 60,000 responses analyzed, they conclude that the difference between having tolerant or racist parents can reach 25% in the attitude that the child will have. Translated: on an attitude scale that goes from 0 to 4 (where 0 is the most tolerant attitude possible and 4 the least), a teenager whose parents are anti-immigration (4 on the scale) will be, on average, one point more racist than another young man from a tolerant family (0 on the scale).
Armed with this knowledge, the researcher is asked if there is any truth to the cliché often used by some people who say that they cannot be racist because they have a black friend. The professor laughs. “We had not thought of that,” he answers at first. “People can say that as an excuse, but don’t use it as an excuse to deny your racism,” he answers more seriously. “I am racist even if I don’t know it, I make inappropriate comments… Even if having a black friend brings you closer to this group of people, you sympathize with them and can better understand the situations they are going through. But that is not an argument,” he assures.
And other vulnerable groups?
Can these findings be extrapolated to attitudes towards other vulnerable and hate-ridden groups, such as the LGTB+ community?
Ubalde offers a nuanced answer. “We have not looked at whether it is useful for other types of marginal situations. Studies have been done for LGBT people, people with disabilities… And yes, these “contact theories” do not only apply to a specific area (racism or xenophobia, in this case), but they can also extend to other minority groups,” he explains.
The researcher, however, expresses more doubts when asked about the effect on social class, given the strong segregation by socio-economic level that education experiences, especially in regions such as the Community of Madrid, but also in the public and private network. concerted: “We are not sure.”
