The effect of school racial composition on Hispanic intergroup relations

The present study examined how intergroup attitudes and behavior among Hispanic middle school students varied as a function of school racial/ethnic composition. Data were derived from a survey of all students present in the sixth to eighth grades of three public middle schools (N = 1,837). The schools represented three distinctive racial compositions: Hispanic/Black, Hispanic/White, and Hispanic majority. Attitudes, as measured by other-group orientation, varied across the three school settings, but not behavior, as measured by reported number of cross-race close friendships. Differences between the Hispanic/Black and Hispanic/White schools in perceived comfort of close friends with cross-race social interaction suggested a social norms or cultural distance interpretation of the results. The revised contact hypothesis was partially supported in that Hispanic students' other-group orientation was predicted by both school racial proportion and reported number of cross-race close friends; however, contrary to theory, cross-race friendships did not contribute more of the variance. A key finding of the study was the importance of perceived comfort level of close friends with cross-race social interaction as a predictor of other-group orientation. The study offers preliminary evidence that there may be important differences in the intergroup relations of Hispanic students in multi-ethnic schools when these are compared with previous studies of Black/White relations.