Racism, parenting styles and mental health in Palestine

The current study was designed to test the correlation between racism, parenting styles, and mental health in Palestine. To test the causal relationship between study variables, regression analysis was performed, while Pearson's correlation coefficient was administered to test the correlation between racism, parenting styles, and mental health. Participants were 408 Palestinian adults, representing 266 females and 142 males, recruited using on line methods. Results of the correlational analysis showed that authoritative parenting style positively correlated with accepting attitudes (r = 0.18, p <.01), and mental health (r = 0.38, p <.01). Moreover, authoritarian parenting style negatively correlated to accepting attitudes (r = −0.25, p <.05), and mental health (r = −0.29, p <.05), while positively correlated with racist attitudes (r = 0.20, p <.05), and ethnocentric attitudes (r = 0.16, p <.05). The regression analysis for predicting mental health found that authoritative parenting style contributed in a statistically significant manner towards explaining variance in mental health (B = 0.28, SE = 0.07, β = 0.29). Knowing what factors contribute to creating racism can be the first step in the ability to reduce this public health crisis that leads to directly community conflict, war, differential access to healthcare, education and career opportunities as well as unequal rates of incarceration, victimization, and death even in highly conflictual zones. Further investigations are recommended to test the association between current study variables and other related variables, and to develop intervention programs that targeting parenting styles, and racism to enhance mental health outcomes among sons.