Disparities by Skin Color Among Young African-American Women
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Disparities by Skin Color Among Young African-American Women Kristen R. Moore 1
&
David R. Williams 2,3
&
Donna D. Baird 1
Received: 16 April 2020 / Revised: 18 August 2020 / Accepted: 24 August 2020 # This is a U.S. government work and its text is not subject to copyright protection in the United States; however, its text may be subject to foreign copyright protection 2020
Abstract Objective Light-skin disadvantage (hypothesized to result from resentment by darker-skinned individuals) has been described in majority African-American populations but is less studied than dark-skin disadvantage. We investigated both light- and dark-skin disadvantage in a contemporary African-American study population. Methods We used skin reflectance and questionnaire data from 1693, young African-American women in Detroit, Michigan, and dichotomized outcomes as advantaged/disadvantaged. We compared outcomes for women with light vs. medium skin color with prevalence differences (PDs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs), and dark-skin disadvantage with prevalence ratios (PRs) and 95% CIs for a 10-unit increase in skin color. Results There was little evidence for light-skin disadvantage, but darker skin was associated with disadvantage across socioeconomic, health, and psychosocial domains. The strongest associations were for SES, but even controlling for SES, other associations included higher body mass index (PR 1.14 95% CI 1.08–1.20) and more stressful events (PR 1.10 95% CI 1.01–1.20). Conclusions Dark-skin disadvantage was the predominant form of colorism. Skin color metrics in public health research can capture more information than simple racial/ethnic categories, and such research could bring awareness to the deep-rooted colorism in society. Keywords Skin color . Colorism . Disparities . African-American
Introduction Disparities in the health, well-being, and socioeconomic status (SES) of racial/ethnic groups has been a noteworthy area of research globally for decades. Special focus in the USA has been placed on inter-racial/ethnic (out-group) comparisons between American Whites and Blacks (or AfricanAmericans) [1]. Recent studies demonstrate that marked disparities between Whites and African-Americans continue to
Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1007/s40615-020-00856-x) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. * Kristen R. Moore [email protected] 1
Epidemiology Branch A3-05, National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, Research Triangle Park, Durham, NC 27709, USA
2
Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA, USA
3
Department of African and African American Studies, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA
exist and are theorized to be due at least partially to the historical and current pervasiveness of racism and discrimination [2, 3]. Historically, intra-racial/ethnic (within-group) disparities associated with differences in skin color, also known as skin tone
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