Religious Support Mediates the Racial Microaggressions-Mental Health Relation Among Christian Ethnic Minority Students

The author examined the mediating role of perceived support from religious sources (i.e., religious support; Fiala, Bjorck, & Gorsuch, 2002) in the inverse relation between racial microaggressions and well-being in a sample of Christian ethnic minority students. A modified version of the support deterioration model (Barrera, 1986) was used as the conceptual framework. It was hypothesized that the nature of the indirect effect would be (a) an inverse relation between racial microaggressions and religious support, and (b) a positive relation between religious support and well-being. Religious commitment was entered as a covariate. African American, Asian American, and Hispanic college students (N = 144) completed an online survey. The study design was cross-sectional. A significant indirect effect of racial microaggressions on psychological well-being through congregational support was found, with findings pointing to the empirical utility of religious support in explaining the racial microaggressions-mental health link among ethnic minority samples.