Contextual Approach to Integration Challenges Among Cuban-Born Latinas in U.S

urpose: By 2050 Latinos will represent 29% of the nation’s population. Cuban Latinos—the third largest Latino subgroup in the U.S.—have a distinct U.S migration experience due to unique geopolitical, economic, and historical factors. Unfortunately, much research examining the impact of acculturation on mental health has focused on Latinos in general and has mostly drawn conclusions based on samples from Mexican populations. This study focused specifically on how acculturative stress affects Cuban-born women residing in the U.S. We specified contextual factors specific to this group that either diminish or exacerbate their acculturative stress. We used Family Stress Management (FSM) theory to identify a wide range of contexts that could impact acculturative stress and mental health among this population.

Methods:  The study included 264 Cuban-born women participants in the National Latino Asian American Survey (NLAAS).  Mediation path analysis in MPLUS was used to estimate relationships between contextual factors, acculturative stress, and psychological distress. Prior to entering various variables into models, bivariate analyses were administered to assess correlations between the contextual factors examined in this study and acculturative stress and psychological distress. The use of specification search helped identify a better-fitting model and Modification Index (MI) informed our inclusion of specific parameters. MPLUS automatically calculated the indirect effects of covariates estimated in this study. We employed Maximum Likelihood Method (MLR), an estimator robust to non-normality, because standard errors estimated through MLR are very close to those produced through “bootstrap” methods. Nonetheless, we cross-validated the estimated model using the holdover cross-validation technique. Interactions between the various contexts in terms of predicting acculturative stress were estimated using Stata’s fitint software. The fit of the data to the final model was adequate. Chi-square was non-significant, Comparative Fit Index (CFI) and Tucker Lewis Index (TFI) were greater than 0.95, and Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA) was less than 0.05.

 Results: Religious comfort (b=.38; p=.02) difficulty visiting family abroad (b=0.28; p=.01), racial discrimination (b=26; p=0.05), and age at immigration (b=0.18; p=0.4) were positively associated with acculturative stress among Cuban-born women. Being content with decision to move to the U.S. (b=-.49; p=0.02) and English skills (b=0.33; p=0.01) were negatively associated with acculturative stress. Acculturative stress mediated the impact of the difficulties visiting family abroad, racial discrimination, and English skills in psychological distress. When assessing the relationships between contextual factors and psychological distress, we found that age (b=0.17; p=0.03) and family-cultural conflict (b=0.28; p=0.01) were positively associated with psychological distress among this population. Cultural context impacted the psychological distress of Cuban immigrant women the most.

Implications: By recognizing the diversity of the Hispanic pan-ethnicity and studying the experiences of one sizeable subgroup, we began to fill a significant gap in literature that frequently treats Latinos as a monolithic cultural group. The results inform practitioners in considering the contextual factors that have a significant impact on the psychological distress of this subgroup of Cuban-born Latinas and the resources that are needed to promote a stress-free and healthy integration.