Workplace Confidence Among Latine/x Immigrants: The Role of Heterogeneous Identities, Social Support, and Policy

Background: According to the United Nations, workplace well-being is a fundamental human right. Confidence at work is associated with myriad short-term and long-term consequences, such as productivity, wealth generation, and positive mental health. Latine/x immigrants may be exposed to conditions that erode workplace confidence; eg. hazardous jobs, exploitation, and anti-immigrant rhetoric/policies. Given this community’s heterogeneous identities (eg., various socioeconomic statuses, countries of origin, English abilities), not all Latine/x immigrants experience the same circumstances that directly or indirectly impact their workplace. Additionally, evidence suggests that social support may mitigate the factors that could adversely impact confidence in the workplace.

Purpose: In collaboration with a large nonprofit serving both Latine/x communities in Baltimore, this study was co-designed to explore questions about workforce participation and well-being among the agency’s clients. Funding was received from a small internal grant at the university.

Methods: Phase I:94 clients completed a survey that included standardized measures of barriers to employment, discrimination, and confidence in the workplace, in addition to agency/researcher created questions. Everyone was compensated $10. Using an explanatory sequential mixed-methods design, in Phase 2, 17 people participated in a semi-structured interview that lasted 30-60 minutes to learn more about their employment experiences and they received $25 for participation. After data cleaning by a bilingual team member, a multiple linear regression was performed to determine the amount of variance in confidence in the workplace explained by the participants’ heterogeneous identities (i.e., gender, education level, annual income, English ability, and country of origin).

Interviews were audio-recorded, transcribed, and coded in Spanish. Open coding was done on five interview transcripts to determine emerging themes and a codebook, then all were deductively by 2 researchers.

Results: The model suggests that 19.5% (Adjusted R2= 0.193; p ≤ 0.001) of the variance in confidence scores is explained by gender, education level, annual income, English ability, and country of origin. Education level (ß = -0.350; p ≤ 0.001) and annual income (ß = - 0.24; p ≤ 0.001) had a statistically significant negative impact on confidence scores. The following themes emerged from the qualitative analysis: solving problems, overcoming obstacles, agency and respect, uncertainty, and social support. All items from the confidence subscale were featured in participants’ responses. Agency and respect, and uncertainty were additional constructs found to undermine workplace confidence, while social support was contributive.

Conclusion: Consistent with the literature, our results suggest that social identity (and English ability may contribute to being confident at work for Latine/x immigrants. However, contrary to expectations, those with higher SES backgrounds reported less workplace confidence. Community-engaged member checking indicated that this could be due to higher SES Latine/x immigrants being more likely to work in settings that are English-speaking only and with non-Latine/x immigrants, which could have additional adverse effects on social support. The quantitative results were supported and expanded by the qualitative findings. With the recent anti-immigrant changes in administration, we will discuss up to date policy implications in January 2026.