Racial Differences On Psychological Well-Being Of Never-Married and Divorced/Separated Women: Is Self-Esteem A Key Psychosocial Resource?

Background: The number of never-married or divorced/separated women in the United States has increased significantly over the last 20 years, especially among African-Americans. With increased opportunities for employment and education, more women than before choose to live independently without spouses or children. Although being single has many benefits, research suggests that married people enjoy better mental health than non-married ones (Cotten, 1999; Keith, 2003). Previous research asserts that marriage becomes a source of support, stability and self-validation that single individuals might lack (Keith, 2003). Meanwhile, social resource theory and previous studies suggest that single women with greater psychosocial resources including self-esteem experience lower level of stress (Cotton, 1999; Turner & Roszell, 1994). These studies, however, have not addressed racial variations despite existing evidences of different family structures across race. This study, therefore, explores racial differences in testing following hypotheses: (1) The never-married and the divorced/separated women are more distressed psychologically than the married and the widowed counterparts; (2) Higher level of self-esteem is expected to have a buffering effect in the association between marital status and psychological well-being.

Methods: The 1995 Detroit Area Study (DAS) was used. The sample for this study consists only of African-American and white women (N=693). Those women who self-identified as white consist of 42.1% (n=292) of the sample, those who self-identified as African-American 57.9% (n=401). The dependent variable, psychological well-being, and the moderator variable, self-esteem, were measured by a multi-item scale and the reliabilities (alpha) was .62 and .66 respectively. The independent variable, marital status, was categorized into four groups: the married, the divorced/separated, the widowed, and the never-married (Cotton, 1999). Data analysis was performed through a series of Analysis of Variance followed by Tukey post-hoc comparisons.

Results: Results showed that the level of psychological well-being varied by marital status with statistical significance in the total sample (F (3,681) = 9.452, p<.001). The level of psychological well-being was the highest among married women followed by the widowed. Married women's level of psychological well-being was higher than that of the divorced/separated and the never-married. Among whites, divorced/separated women were more distressed psychologically than any other groups. Among African-Americans, in contrast, the never-married were the most distressed group while the never-married whites showed the second highest level of well-being. Self-esteem was a significant moderator only among African-Americans (F (6, 385)=2.186, p<.05) while it was neither among whites nor overall.

Implications: This study showed racial variations in the relationship between marital status and psychological well-being. Whereas the divorced/separated were the most distressed group among whites, the never-married was among African-Americans. Further, self-esteem was shown to be a significant psychosocial resource for African-American women in attenuating negative effects of marital status on psychological well-being. It is suggested that counselors and/or support groups may help African-American women effectively by heightening their level of self-esteem. Subsequent research may be directed to elucidating reasons for the shown racial differences and identifying risk factors for the increased distress among African-American never-married women and white divorced/separated women.