Beyond Ethnicity: Applying Helms’s White Racial Identity Development Model Among White Youth
Abstract
Research on racial identity among Youth of Color has expanded considerably in recent years, but a parallel examination of racial identity among white youth has not occurred, reiterating whiteness as normative. We applied Janet Helms's White Racial Identity Development (WRID) model among white U.S. youth (8-14 years old) to address this research gap. WRID centers racism and white supremacy, offering a framework to analyze white racial identity in the context of systemic inequity. Using longitudinal, qualitative analysis, we found age-related change over time, with some evidence of increasing resistance to racism. There was high participant variability, however, indicating that socio-cognitive abilities alone cannot predict anti-racist white identity development. We discuss implications for racial identity research and social justice-orientated developmental science.
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Studying Ethnic-Racial Identity among White Youth: White Supremacy as a Developmental Context
Moffitt, U., & Rogers, L. O. (2022) · Journal of Research on Adolescence · doi:10.1111/jora.12762 · Cited by 81 · see citing works
“A white 6th grader saying, for instance, that race, “just really doesn’t matter,” (Moffitt et al., 2021) tells us something about her own racial identity, about the socialization she is receiving, and about the society she lives in.”
BackgroundInfluentialSelf-citation
- Authors
- Moffitt, U., Rogers, L. O., & Dastrup, K. R. H.
- Affiliations
- Northwestern University (US)
- University of Washington (US)
- Corresponding author
- Moffitt, Ursula
- Venue
- Journal of Research on Adolescence
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 2021-07-21
- Volume
- 32
- Issue
- 3
- Pages
- 1140-1159
- ISSN
- 1050-8392 (ISSN-L)
- 1532-7795
- OpenAlex
- W3184937646
- Cited by
- 63
- References
- 13
- Citations by year
- 2026: 9 · 2025: 11 · 2024: 21 · 2023: 10 · 2022: 11 · 2021: 1
- FWCI
- 14.89
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Journal of Research on Adolescence (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Racial and Ethnic Identity Research
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Social and Intergroup Psychology
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Critical Race Theory in Education
- Keywords
- white youth, whiteness, racism, white supremacy, age-related changes, resistance to racism, socio-cognitive abilities, racial identity, social justice
- MeSH terms
- Adolescent, Child, Ethnicity, Humans, Social Justice, Racism
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