Degrading attitudes related to foreign appearance: interviews with Swedish female adoptees from Asia.

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Degrading attitudes related to foreign appearance: interviews with Swedish female adoptees from Asia.

Introduction

The increased risks among international adoptees of social (eg criminality and drug/alcohol misuse) and psychiatric (eg suicidal behaviour) problems (Verhulst et al, 1990; Hjern et al, 2002; Tieman et al, 2005) present continuous challenges to social work and medical professionals. For researchers, a major concern is to identify the background factors that explain these risks and show how they can be modified by individual or general interventions. For society, the challenge is two-fold: firstly, to fulfil an overarching responsibility for the adoption procedure and the well-being of the families concerned; and secondly, to employ a variety of methods to improve interventions--for example, pre-adoption assessments of parental capacity, education for prospective adopters and instruments to monitor the development of the child.

Experiences of prejudice related to foreign appearance constitute one potential contribution to the problems described. (1) But, even if there is no link between exposure to racism and mental ill-health, racism is still an important issue for adoptees as it affects their quality of life and has obvious ethical implications. (2)

The impact of perceived ethnic discrimination on health is a relatively new research area of growing scientific interest. In a meta-analysis based on studies published since 2000, 25 studies (mostly on adults) explored the link between perceived discrimination and mental health (Williams et al, 2003). Twenty of these reported a positive association, three a conditional relationship and two no association at all. Even though the relationship seems fairly well supported, questions about causality and mediating mechanisms still need to be answered.

Williams (2003) described one type of discrimination as 'non-events'. These are defined as 'desired and expected experiences that fail to occur'. An example of a 'non-event' is discrimination when seeking employment. Indeed, two previous studies using a similar approach found that international adoptees with a foreign appearance had more difficulties entering the labour market than non-adopted individuals or adoptees without a foreign appearance (Rooth 2001; Lindblad et al, 2003).

Racism also means exposure to ethnic stereotypes. For instance, gender-specific cultural stereotypes may affect Asian females living in Western countries (see, for example, Chan, 1987). From a...

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