Ethnic identity as a predictor of attitudes of adolescents toward fighting

The purpose for this study was to examine to what extent ethnic identify wo uld predict attitudes toward fighting among African American and Latino and Latina early adolescents (n = 330) in the presence of two factors, parenta l involvement and negative peer behaviors, which have emerged consistently as predictors of violent and antisocial behaviors among adolescents. Result s indicated that for the African American participants, ethnic identity acc ounted for variation in their nonfighting attitudes beyond that accounted f or by parental control and negative peer behaviors. Ethnic identity did not emerge as a predictor of attitudes toward fighting for the Latino and Lati na adolescents. Girls from both ethnic groups reported higher endorsement o f profighting attitudes than did boys. However gender did not emerge as a s tatistically significant predictor of fighting attitudes in the presence of the other three predictor variables: ethnic identity, parental involvement , and negative peer behaviors.