Language, Culture, and Adaptation in Immigrant Children

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Overview

In this article the authors first discuss why it is crucial, from a clinical and public health perspective, to better understand the development as well as risk and protection processes for the mental health of immigrant children. This article focuses on Latino immigrant children because they represent the majority of immigrant children in America and it is a way to illustrate the risks and circumstances that are potentially shared by other immigrant groups. The authors then shift focus to the

Demographic Significance of Child Immigration

America is currently experiencing the largest wave of child immigration in its history. Children of immigrants constitute the largest minority and the fastest growing segment of the US child population.1, 2 One out of 7 children was from an immigrant family in 1990, more than 1 out of 5 children has such a background in 2010, and it is estimated that these figures will rise to 1 out of 3 children by the year 2020.3 There is a significant 3-way overlap between Latino, dual language, and

The development of dual language (bilingual) competence

Most of the research on language development has centered on monolingual children. Although the study of children acquiring 2 or more languages is still in its early stages, significant progress made in the last 3 decades is reviewed in the section that follows.

Association of Language Competence and Psychosocial Adaptation

It has been well documented that language competence is a critical contributor to the emotional and behavioral development of monolingual children.37, 93 However, less is known about how this contribution is represented for children who speak multiple languages. The empirical research focusing on the association between dual language linguistic competence and mental health and emotional/behavioral functioning is limited.94 Thus, the authors will first review the related research in monolingual

Differences between dual-culture acquisition and dual language acquisition

Second culture contact may result in challenging or overwhelming demands, known as acculturative stress. Second culture contact and second language contact often co-occur, so that acculturative demands overlap with language demands. However, each one sets in motion different specialized responses. Acculturative demands are met by the immigrant’s varying degrees of bicultural competence, resulting in bicultural or monocultural adaptation (or maladaptation) with their mental health implications.

Clinical and policy implications

Dual language children often enter school with a wide variability of competences in their L1 and L2, and a large proportion of these children have low competences in 1 or both languages. However, many are able to meet developmental expectations during the first 2 years of school. Latino children of immigrants often grow up in linguistic isolation, enter school at a disadvantage, and experience increasing academic achievement gaps and mental health disparities over time. From a developmental

Summary

The study of dual language acquisition and how its developmental trajectories impacts the overall wellbeing and mental health of the immigrant child is in its early stages,148 requiring further major empirical and theoretical work. Nonetheless, several important implications can be derived from extant developmental and clinical research: (1) Decisions about discontinuing learning or exposure to one of the languages should not be made lightly and should consider the personal and family

Acknowledgments

The first author expresses his special gratitude to his late mentor, Stuart Hauser, MD, PhD, who provided him with inspiration, insight, and support over many years of working together.

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    This study was supported primarily by National Institute of Mental Health grant number K01 MH01947-01A2 and by an Early Investigator Grant from the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.

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