title: Racial Discrimination, Cultural Resilience, and Stress.
abstract: Racial discrimination is a social determinant of health for First Nations people. Cultural resilience has been regarded as a potentially positive resource for social outcomes. Using a compensatory model of resilience, this study sought to determine if cultural resilience (compensatory factor) neutralized or offset the detrimental effect of racial discrimination (social risk factor) on stress (outcome).
  
  
  
  Data were collected from October 2012 to February 2013 (N = 340) from adult members of the Kettle and Stony Point First Nation community in Ontario, Canada. The outcome was perceived stress; risk factor, racial discrimination; and compensatory factor, cultural resilience. Control variables included individual (education, sociability) and family (marital status, socioeconomic status) resilience resources and demographics (age and gender). The model was tested using sequential regression.
  
  
  
  The risk factor, racial discrimination, increased stress across steps of the sequential model, while cultural resilience had an opposite modest effect on stress levels. In the final model with all variables, age and gender were significant, with the former having a negative effect on stress and women reporting higher levels of stress than males. Education, marital status, and socioeconomic status (household income) were not significant in the model. The model had R(2) = 0.21 and adjusted R(2) = 0.18 and semipartial correlation (squared) of 0.04 and 0.01 for racial discrimination and cultural resilience, respectively.
  
  
  
  In this study, cultural resilience compensated for the detrimental effect of racial discrimination on stress in a modest manner. These findings may support the development of programs and services fostering First Nations culture, pending further study.
authors.affiliation: Harvard Medical School, Harvard University, Boston, MA, USA nspence@mgh.harvard.edu.
authors.forename: Nicholas D
authors.initials: ND
authors.lastname: Spence
authors.affiliation: Social and Epidemiological Research Department, Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, London, Ontario, Canada Dalla Lana School of Public Health, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Western University, London, Ontario, Canada School of Psychology, Deakin University, Australia.
authors.forename: Samantha
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Wells
authors.affiliation: Social and Epidemiological Research Department, Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, London, Ontario, Canada Dalla Lana School of Public Health, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada Department of Psychology, Western University, London, Ontario, Canada National Drug Research Institute, Curtin University, Perth, Western Australia.
authors.forename: Kathryn
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Graham
authors.affiliation: Social and Epidemiological Research Department, Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, London, Ontario, Canada Mental Health and Addiction Services, Kettle & Stony Point Health Services, Kettle & Stony Point First Nation, Ontario, Canada.
authors.forename: Julie
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: George
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D003469:Culture; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007198:Indians, North American / Q000208:ethnology*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009864:Ontario / Q000208:ethnology; D063505:Racism / Q000208:ethnology*; D055500:Resilience, Psychological; D013315:Stress, Psychological / Q000208:ethnology*; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Aboriginal; First Nations; culture; health; racial discrimination; resilience; stress