Research – Reducing racial disparities in Health
Research
Reducing racial disparities in Health: Addressing structural discrimination and resilience
Objectives of this project:
- Develop a measure of structural racial discrimination and resilience
- Disseminate the novel instrument to NIH-funded studies for data collection
- Develop tailored interventions with feedback from all stakeholders to reduce racial disparities in health and increase resilience
Measure Structural Discrimination
Develop a measure of structural discrimination across the life course
This project is a mixed-methods instrument design that aims to develop an instrument that can quantify underrepresented older adults’ exposure to structural racial discrimination across contexts, across the lifecourse, and across levels of geographic granularity. The phases of this study include:
- A systematic literature review to identify foundational theory and to identify specific measurement gaps
- A Think Tank with discrimination researchers to theorize contexts
- Qualitative interviews with fifteen older Black adults in Baltimore, Maryland to assess the fit of theory and contexts
- Context-specific focus groups with discrimination researchers and other key stakeholders to identify potential instrument items
- Item drafting and revision based on previous phases and review of publicly available datasets
- An online feasibility pilot of the instrument with 220 older adults.
- Refinement of instrument and administration with a combined population and convenience sample of 3,940 older adults
Measure Structural Resilience
Develop a measure of structural resilience across the lifecourse and produce a creative piece that explores resilience structures
This project is a mixed-methods instrument design that aims to develop an instrument that can quantify older Black Americans’ exposure to structures of resilience across contexts, across the lifecourse, and geographies. The phases of this study include:
- Qualitative interviews with fifteen older Black adults in Baltimore, Maryland to identify the structures of resilience across the life course
- Context-specific focus groups with researchers and other key stakeholders to identify potential instrument items
- Item drafting and revision based on previous phases and review of publicly available datasets
- Map resilience resources to the lifecourse addresses collected from the structural discrimination survey and build a structural resilience score
- Develop creative artwork that displays the resilience structures across the life course