Examining racial identity statuses as predictors of psychological defensesin African American college students

The authors examined the relationship between racial identity statuses and the use of psychological defenses in 80 African American college students w ho completed the Black Racial Identity Attitude Scale (J. E. Helms & T. A. Parham, 1996), Defense Mechanism Inventory (G. C. Gleser & D. Ihilevich, 19 69), and the Defense Style Questionnaire-40 (G. Andrews, M. Singh, & M. Bon d, 1993). The canonical analysis indicated that pre-encounter and encounter ego statuses were positively related to neurotic psychological defenses as well as defenses of principalization and reversal. The immersion ego statu s was positively related to immature psychological defenses as well as turn ing against object and projection. The emersion ego status was positively r elated to mature psychological defenses as well as turning against object a nd projection. The authors believe these results provide additional support for J. E. Helms's (1995) racial identity model, because racial identity eg o statuses predicted how African Americans managed painful affect. The disc ussion also focuses on implications of these results for counseling and fut ure research.