title: Feeling (Mis)Understood and Intergroup Friendships in Interracial Interactions.
abstract: The present research investigated whether having out-group friends serves as a buffer for feeling misunderstood in interracial interactions. Across three experience sampling studies, we found that among ethnic minorities who have few White friends or are not interacting with White friends, daily interracial interactions are associated with feeling less understood. By contrast, we found that among ethnic minorities who have more White friends or are interacting with White friends, the relationship between daily interracial interactions and feeling understood is not significant. We did not find similar results for Whites; that is, having ethnic minority friends did not play a role in the relationship between daily interracial interactions and feeling understood. Together, these studies demonstrate the beneficial effects of intergroup friendships for ethnic minorities.
authors.affiliation: Princeton University, NJ, USA nshelton@princeton.edu.
authors.forename: Nicole
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Shelton
authors.affiliation: Arizona State University, Phoenix, USA.
authors.forename: Sara
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Douglass
authors.affiliation: Princeton University, NJ, USA.
authors.forename: Randi L
authors.initials: RL
authors.lastname: Garcia
authors.affiliation: Fordham University, Bronx, NY, USA.
authors.forename: Tiffany
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Yip
authors.affiliation: RAND Corporation, Arlington, VA, USA.
authors.forename: Thomas E
authors.initials: TE
authors.lastname: Trail
keywords: felt understanding; intergroup friendships; interracial interactions