COVID-19, Racial Discrimination and Civic Engagement Among Asian-American Young Adults

The COVID-19 pandemic provoked a spike in racial discrimination and hate crimes against Asian Americans. We know that discrimination negatively affects physical and mental health, but less is known about its influences on civic engagement, such as involvement in community organizations, community services, and volunteering and political participation such as voting, making political donations, and protesting. Yoonsun Choi and Bongki Woo will draw on a longitudinal study of Filipino Americans and Korean Americans to examine how experiences of discrimination, and COVID-related discrimination in particular, affect civic engagement among Asian-American young adults. The Midwest Longitudinal Study of Asian American Families (MLSAAF) interviewed young adults and their parents living in or near Chicago in three waves: 2014, 2016, and 2018. For this research project, the investigators will interview a large sample of the first wave of MLSAAF respondents. The COVID-19 pandemic and its consequences offer a natural experiment to study the relationships between discrimination and civic engagement. The researchers will examine the extent to which types of discrimination (e.g., explicit vs. implicit or general vs. event-specific) influence civic engagement, and whether they vary by ethnicity and nativity.