Threat Appraisal and Coping: A Moderated Mediation of Racism-Related Trauma in Black Americans

Abstract

Research indicates that Black Americans are at higher risk for trauma symptoms due to exposure to racial discrimination. However, the degree to which Black Americans appraise discriminatory events as threatening and how their coping with discrimination affects traumatization remains unclear. In the current study, an online sample of Black American adults (N = 414), threat appraisal was tested as a mechanism through which direct and vicarious discrimination predicts trauma symptoms. Coping strategies were explored as potentially influencing the impact of discrimination on trauma. Perceived racial discrimination had a large effect (r = .67) on trauma symptoms and both direct and vicarious racism were positively related to trauma symptoms through threat appraisal. Avoidant coping (i.e., disengagement or withdrawal from reminders of stressors) strengthened the effect of direct discrimination on trauma symptoms in middle-aged and older Black Americans but not younger adults. Additionally, neither problem-focused nor social support coping influenced the discrimination–trauma relationship. The implications of the findings, possible future directions, and limitations of the study are discussed.

Keywords

racial discrimination African American vicarious racism appraisal racial trauma

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