Commitment and paradox in sociological research: School integration in Israel*

Panethnicity ‐ the development of bridging organizations and the generalization of solidarity among ethnic subgroups ‐ is important theoretically because it focuses attention on ethnic change, and allows one to assess the relative importance of structural and cultural factors. In this article we present a framework for the study of panethnicity, generate research questions from this framework, and then test these questions by examining panethnicity within four broad racial/ethnic groupings: Asian Americans, Native Americans, Indo Americans and Latinos in the United States. A review of these four cases demonstrates that those groups with the greatest cross‐subgroup structural similarity (Asian Americans and Indo Americans) also display the greatest panethnic development and potential, despite their considerable cultural diversity. This suggests that structural factors are more important for understanding the development of panethnicity and, by extension, for understanding ethnic change generally.     

Fear of crime among Arab Americans in a culture of fear

As the minority group frequently at the centre of public fear in the post-9/11 era, Arab Americans’ own sentiment toward, and concerns with, crime, has eluded scholarly attention. This study investigated their fear of crime net of five empirically validated fear of crime theoretical models. Face-to-face interviews with a random sample of Arab and non-Arab households in Metro-Detroit, Michigan indicated that net of all controls, Arab Americans experienced significantly higher levels of fear concerning both general and bias crimes than non-Arab Americans. The greater fear among Arab Americans calls for policy and practice change, and moving from perceiving Arab Americans as a major “source” of fear, to “carriers” of fear who are in need of more attention, care, and assistance.     

The concentration of Asian Americans in STEM and health-care occupations: an intergenerational comparison

This article examines the concentration of Asian Americans in the STEM and health-care fields of study and occupations by generation, ethnic group and gender, compared to white Americans, based on the 2009–11 American Community Surveys. By making a generational comparison, it suggests that the selective migration of Asian immigrants is the most important factor to their concentration in these fields of study and occupations. Asian immigrants as a whole are highly selective in these fields of study and occupations, compared to white Americans, with some Asian groups showing much higher levels of concentration. While younger-generation Asian groups whose immigrant generations have an extremely high concentration have experienced significant reductions in STEM, the other groups have experienced moderate or significant increases. All younger-generation Asian groups apart from Filipino have significantly or moderately higher levels of representation in non-nurse health-care occupations than their immigrant counterparts.     

Are second-generation Filipinos ‘becoming’ Asian American or Latino? Historical colonialism,culture and panethnicity

Abstract

This article examines how second-generation Filipinos understand their panethnic identity, given their historical connection with both Asians and Latinos, two of the largest panethnic groups in the USA. While previous studies show panethnicity to be a function of shared political interests or class status, I argue that the cultural residuals of historical colonialism in the Philippines, by both Spain and the USA, shape how Filipinos negotiate panethnic boundaries with Asians and Latinos, albeit in different ways. Filipinos cite the cultural remnants of US colonialism as a reason to racially demarcate themselves from Asians, and they allude to the legacies of Spanish colonialism to blur boundaries with Latinos. While the colonial history of Filipinos is unique, these findings have implications for better understanding racialization in an increasingly multiethnic society – namely, how historical legacies in sending societies interact with new racial contexts to influence panethnic identity development.     

Genetic background of patients from a university medical center in Manhattan: implications for personalized medicine

Background

The rapid progress currently being made in genomic science has created interest in potential clinical applications; however, formal translational research has been limited thus far. Studies of population genetics have demonstrated substantial variation in allele frequencies and haplotype structure at loci of medical relevance and the genetic background of patient cohorts may often be complex.

Methods and Findings

To describe the heterogeneity in an unselected clinical sample we used the Affymetrix 6.0 gene array chip to genotype self-identified European Americans (N = 326), African Americans (N = 324) and Hispanics (N = 327) from the medical practice of Mount Sinai Medical Center in Manhattan, NY. Additional data from US minority groups and Brazil were used for external comparison. Substantial variation in ancestral origin was observed for both African Americans and Hispanics; data from the latter group overlapped with both Mexican Americans and Brazilians in the external data sets. A pooled analysis of the African Americans and Hispanics from NY demonstrated a broad continuum of ancestral origin making classification by race/ethnicity uninformative. Selected loci harboring variants associated with medical traits and drug response confirmed substantial within- and between-group heterogeneity.

Conclusion

As a consequence of these complementary levels of heterogeneity group labels offered no guidance at the individual level. These findings demonstrate the complexity involved in clinical translation of the results from genome-wide association studies and suggest that in the genomic era conventional racial/ethnic labels are of little value.     

The ‘success’ image of Asian Americans: Its validity,and its practical and theoretical implications 1

Abstract

The success stereotype of Asian Americans is examined in terms of three major research questions. (1) What factors account for the vicissitudes of the dominant group's perception of Asian Americans since 1850? (2) To what extent is the current success image of Asian Americans true? (3) How would such a model minority image affect Asian Americans, the other minorities, and majority Americans? The first question is addressed by historical data, and the second and third questions are answered by analyses of census data supplemented by other empirical data on Asian Americans. Factors accounting for the changes of the dominant group's image of Asian Americans are found to be primarily situational, and our analyses in the light of the principle of earnings equity indicate that the success image is largely a myth due to labour market disadvantages and other related social problems. Practical and theoretical implications are discussed in the conclusion.     

‘It's a part of me,I feel naked without it': choice,agency and identity for Muslim women who wear the niqab

In the context of heightened suspicion and anti-Muslim stereotypes in a post-9/11 and 7/7 era, Muslim women who wear the niqab (face veil) are stigmatized, criminalized and marked as ‘dangerous’ to British/Western values. While the wearing of the niqab has elicited a good deal of media, political and public debates, little attention has been paid to the opinions of Muslim women who wear it. Drawing on individual and focus group interviews with Muslim women who wear the niqab in the UK, this article places at the centre of the debate the voices of those women who do wear it, and explores their reasons for adopting it. The findings show that the wearing of the niqab emerges as a personal choice, an expression of religious piety, public modesty and belonging to the ‘ummah’. It is also perceived as a form of agency, and non-conformity to Western consumerist culture and lifestyle.     

Beyond Socioeconomics: Explaining Ethnic Group Differences in Parenting Through Cultural and Immigration Processes

This study examined both socioeconomic and cultural factors in explaining ethnic differences in monitoring, behavioral control, and warmth—part of a series of coordinated studies presented in this special issue. Socioeconomic variables included mother's and father's educational levels, employment status, home ownership, number of siblings in the household, and single parent status. Cultural factors included nationality or ethnicity, immigrant status of child, mother's/father's age of arrival in the United States, mother's/father's English language use with the child, child's native fluency, and cultural values for independence and interdependence. The sample consisted of 591 European American, 123 African American, 1,614 Asian American, and 597 Latino students in the ninth grade. All the ethnic minority groups were higher than European Americans on behavioral control, and Latinos were also higher than European Americans on monitoring. However, European Americans were higher on parental warmth than Asian Americans and African Americans. These ethnic group differences primarily remained even after controlling for the socioeconomic factors. Finally, in analyses looking within the Asian and Latino groups, differences in parenting were found within both groups due to nationality or ethnicity, youth's fluency in the native language, and cultural values of interdependence, although values of independence were also related to the parenting of Asian Americans.     

Family Socialization Practices and Their Effects on the Internalization of Educational Values for Asian and White American Adolescents

Based on the theories of internalization and the self, this article examines effective family socialization practices of Asian and White Americans. The results indicated that parental support for autonomy and adolescents' perceived competence while studying favorably affected Asian Americans' internalization of their cultural values relevant to education and academic success. In contrast, for White Americans, these internalization factors did not have a substantial effect on adolescents' school performance. Moreover, for Asian Americans, parents' attitudes had stronger effects on adolescents' school performance in comparison to White American adolescents, whose teacher-awarded grades were attributed to their own academic aspirations. Differences in family socialization practices between Asian and White Americans are discussed within a context of underlying cultural frameworks that promote adolescents' school performance.     

Racial/ethnic variations in male testosterone levels: a probable contributor to group differences in health.

Racial and ethnic variations in serum testosterone levels were investigated among a large sample of male Vietnam era veterans. Based on geometric means, significant average differences were found between 3,654 non-Hispanic white and 525 black individuals. The geometric mean for testosterone levels among 200 Hispanic individuals was similar to that of non-Hispanic white individuals. Regarding two other racial/ethnic groups (Asian/Pacific Islanders and Native Americans), no significant differences were found, due perhaps to small sample sizes. Results were interpreted as having considerable potential for explaining some of the race differences in the incidences of cardiovascular diseases, hypertension, and prostate cancer.     

Leading Causes of Death among Asian American Subgroups (2003–2011)

Background

Our current understanding of Asian American mortality patterns has been distorted by the historical aggregation of diverse Asian subgroups on death certificates, masking important differences in the leading causes of death across subgroups. In this analysis, we aim to fill an important knowledge gap in Asian American health by reporting leading causes of mortality by disaggregated Asian American subgroups.

Methods and Findings

We examined national mortality records for the six largest Asian subgroups (Asian Indian, Chinese, Filipino, Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese) and non-Hispanic Whites (NHWs) from 2003-2011, and ranked the leading causes of death. We calculated all-cause and cause-specific age-adjusted rates, temporal trends with annual percent changes, and rate ratios by race/ethnicity and sex. Rankings revealed that as an aggregated group, cancer was the leading cause of death for Asian Americans. When disaggregated, there was notable heterogeneity. Among women, cancer was the leading cause of death for every group except Asian Indians. In men, cancer was the leading cause of death among Chinese, Korean, and Vietnamese men, while heart disease was the leading cause of death among Asian Indians, Filipino and Japanese men. The proportion of death due to heart disease for Asian Indian males was nearly double that of cancer (31% vs. 18%). Temporal trends showed increased mortality of cancer and diabetes in Asian Indians and Vietnamese; increased stroke mortality in Asian Indians; increased suicide mortality in Koreans; and increased mortality from Alzheimer’s disease for all racial/ethnic groups from 2003-2011. All-cause rate ratios revealed that overall mortality is lower in Asian Americans compared to NHWs.

Conclusions

Our findings show heterogeneity in the leading causes of death among Asian American subgroups. Additional research should focus on culturally competent and cost-effective approaches to prevent and treat specific diseases among these growing diverse populations.     

Self-reported ethnicity, genetic structure and the impact of population stratification in a multiethnic study

It is well-known that population substructure may lead to confounding in case–control association studies. Here, we examined genetic structure in a large racially and ethnically diverse sample consisting of five ethnic groups of the Multiethnic Cohort study (African Americans, Japanese Americans, Latinos, European Americans and Native Hawaiians) using 2,509 SNPs distributed across the genome. Principal component analysis on 6,213 study participants, 18 Native Americans and 11 HapMap III populations revealed four important principal components (PCs): the first two separated Asians, Europeans and Africans, and the third and fourth corresponded to Native American and Native Hawaiian (Polynesian) ancestry, respectively. Individual ethnic composition derived from self-reported parental information matched well to genetic ancestry for Japanese and European Americans. STRUCTURE-estimated individual ancestral proportions for African Americans and Latinos are consistent with previous reports. We quantified the East Asian (mean 27%), European (mean 27%) and Polynesian (mean 46%) ancestral proportions for the first time, to our knowledge, for Native Hawaiians. Simulations based on realistic settings of case–control studies nested in the Multiethnic Cohort found that the effect of population stratification was modest and readily corrected by adjusting for race/ethnicity or by adjusting for top PCs derived from all SNPs or from ancestry informative markers; the power of these approaches was similar when averaged across causal variants simulated based on allele frequencies of the 2,509 genotyped markers. The bias may be large in case-only analysis of gene by gene interactions but it can be corrected by top PCs derived from all SNPs.     

TLR9 polymorphisms and systemic lupus erythematosus risk in Asians: a meta-analysis study

The results from previous studies on association of TLR9 polymorphisms with the risk of systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) remained contradictory. Therefore, a meta-analysis was performed to assess the association between TLR9 polymorphisms and SLE susceptibility. A literature-based search was conducted to identify all relevant studies. Pooled data were estimated by fixed- and random-effects models when appropriate. We examined seven publications, showing that there were only three polymorphisms (-1486C/T, +1174A/G and +1635C/T) existing in Asian populations. The meta-analysis indicated that none of these three polymorphisms showed any significant association with SLE risk in Asian populations. In conclusion, the present study indicates that TLR9 polymorphisms are not candidates for susceptibility to SLE, at least, in eastern Asian population. Furthermore, a large number of studies should be performed to explore the association of TLR9 polymorphisms with the risk of SLE in other populations, such as Europeans, Americans and Africans.     

A cross-sectional characterization of insulin resistance by phenotype and insulin clamp in East Asian Americans with type 1 and type 2 diabetes

Objective

Classic features of type 1 and type 2 diabetes may not apply in Asian Americans, due to shared absence of common HLA DR-DQ genotype, low prevalence of positive anti-islet antibodies and low BMI in both types of diabetes. Our objective was to characterize diabetic phenotypes in Asian Americans by clamp and clinical features.

Materials/Methods

This was a cross-sectional study conducted in a referral center. Thirty East young Asian American adult volunteers (27.6±5.5 years) with type 1, type 2 diabetes or controls underwent hyperinsulinemic euglycemic clamp to assess insulin resistance and DEXA to assess adiposity.

Results

Gender, BMI, waist/hip ratio, leptin, LDL, anti-GAD, anti-IA2 antibodies and C-reactive protein were similar among three groups. Serum C-peptide, adiponectin, free fatty acid, HDL concentrations and truncal fat by DEXA, were different between diabetic groups. Glucose disposal rate by clamp was lowest in type 2 diabetes, followed by type 1 diabetes and controls (5.43±2.70, 7.62±2.59, 8.61±2.37 mg/min/kg, respectively, p = 0.001). Free fatty acid concentration universally plummeted during steady state of the clamp procedure regardless of diabetes types in all three groups. Adipocyte fatty acid binding protein in the entire cohort (r = −0.625, p = 0.04) and controls (r = −0.869, p = 0.046) correlated best with insulin resistance, independent of BMI.

Conclusions

Type 2 diabetes in Asian Americans was associated with insulin resistance despite having low BMI as type 1 diabetes, suggesting a potential role for targeting insulin resistance apart from weight loss. Adipocyte fatty acid binding protein, strongly associated with insulin resistance, independent of adiposity in the young Asian American population, may potentially serve as a biomarker to identify at-risk individuals. Larger studies are needed to confirm this finding.     

Explaining Asian American achievement

ABSTRACT

Jennifer Lee and Min Zhou’s The Asian American Achievement Paradox is a remarkable analysis of the educational upward mobility of Chinese and Vietnamese Americans in Los Angeles. It also provides important insights about the status of contemporary Asian Americans more generally. While critical of the ‘model minority’ thesis, the authors take seriously the role of culture in fostering educational attainment. However, their emphasis on immigrant selectivity and individual psychology may be misplaced when it comes to understanding the achievement of second-generation groups.     

Is Yuan in China’s Three Gorges a Gibbon or a Langur?

Clarifying the scientific identity of ancient biological names in historical archives is essential to understand traditional knowledge and literary metaphors of animals in human culture. Adopting a cross-disciplinary (Primatology, Linguistics, Historiography, Historical Sociology) analysis, we developed a theoretical framework for studies of the scientific identity of Chinese primate traditional names (e.g., Yuan _猿) throughout history, and interpret the historical evolution of the understanding of the Chinese word Yuan. Presently, the Chinese generally understand Yuan to be a gibbon (or “ape” in a broader sense), but this statement has many contradictions with the understanding of the word in relevant historical discourse. We review and comment on key evidence to support the traditional understanding of Yuan as a gibbon (Hylobatidae) and clarify the historical and current thought concerning Yuan. We find that the referent of the word Yuan has changed from “François’ langur (Trachypithecus francoisi) with long limbs” to the “long-armed ape or gibbon” known today through two major changes in the idea of Yuan. One transformation in the conceptualization of Yuan took place during the Tang-Song period, with the other beginning at the end of the nineteenth century and ending in the 1950s. An interaction between the conceptualization of animals and power (e.g., political opportunity; cultural movement toward learning western sciences in the semi-colonial era) played an important role in these two diachronic changes to the idea of Yuan. In contrast to the clear linear relation between a species and its Latin name, our study indicates that one traditional name can represent varying animal species in China. Our findings exemplify the implications of the sociocultural and linguistic basis for the species identification of primate names found in historical discourse for historical zoogeography, our understanding of the intricate cultural and religious connections between humans and primates, and efforts to decolonize primatology.

     

The identification of a (CGG)6AGG insertion within the CGG repeat of the FMR1 gene in Asians

We have evaluated the structure of the CGG repeat within the FMR1 gene of an Asian population and found the most common size of the repeat to be 29 and 30 with a minor population of 36 repeats. We have isolated and sequenced DNA containing the 36 repeats and found the basis sequence to be (CGG)₉AGG(CGG)₉AGG(CGG)₆AGG(CGG)₉; with a (CGG)₆)AGG insertion, designated as 9A9A6A9. Of 144 Asian chromosomes, 11 (8%) had sequences with this insertion. Six different variations of the basic sequence were observed in the population: 9A9A6A2A9, 9A9A6A11, 9A9A16, 9A9A15, 8A9A6A6A9, and 11A6A6A9. All but one of the chromosomes with the insertion had the haplotype of DXS548/ FRAXAC1: 194/D suggesting that the sequences with the 6A insertion arose from a single ancestral allele. We have not observed the insertion in the FMR1 gene of Caucasians or Native Americans. The (CGG)₆AGG insertion may be unique to Asians. Received: 3 December 1996 / Revised: 14 January 1997     

The reigning misperception about culture and Asian American achievement

ABSTRACT

Asian Americans graduate from college at higher rates than other groups, and evince educational outcomes that match or exceed those of their parents. They comprise about 25 per cent of the student body in Ivy League institutions, despite making up only 6 per cent of the U.S. population. While it may be tempting to reduce Asian American academic achievement to Asian culture, and Confucian values more specifically, we provide disconfirming evidence, both within the United States and beyond, to show the fallacy of this logic. Contemporary U.S. Asian immigrants are “hyper-selected”: they are more likely to have graduated from college than their non-migrant counterparts, and also more likely to be college-educated than the U.S. mean. Hyper-selectivity and its spillover effects explain the exceptional educational outcomes of Asian Americans. It is time that we laid to rest the reigning misperception that Asian American academic achievement can be reduced to Asian culture or Confucian values.     

Interethnic and intraethnic variability of CYP2C8 and CYP2C9 polymorphisms in healthy individuals

Cytochrome P450 (CYP) superfamily members CYP2C8 and CYP2C9 are polymorphically expressed enzymes that are involved in the metabolic inactivation of several drugs, including, among others, antiepileptics, NSAIDs, oral hypoglycemics, and anticoagulants. Many of these drugs have a narrow therapeutic index, and growing evidence indicates a prominent role of CYP2C8 and CYP2C9 polymorphisms in the therapeutic efficacy and in the development of adverse effects among patients treated with drugs that are CYP2C8 or CYP2C9 substrates. In this review, we summarize present knowledge on human variability in the frequency of variant CYP2C8 and CYP2C9 alleles. Besides an expected interethnic variability in allele frequencies, a large intraethnic variability exists. Among Asian subjects, for example, statistically significant differences (p < 0.0001) in CYP2C9*3 allele frequencies between Chinese and Japanese individuals have been reported. In addition, individuals from East Asia present different allele frequencies for CYP2C9*2 and CYP2C9*3 compared with South Asian subjects (p < 0.0001). Among Caucasian Europeans, statistically significant differences for the frequency of CYP2C8*3, CYP2C9*2, and CYP2C9*3 exist (p < 0.0001). This indicates that Asian individuals or Caucasian European individuals cannot be considered as homogeneous groups regarding CYP2C8 or CYP2C9 allele frequencies. Caucasian American subjects also show a large variability in allele frequencies, which is likely to be related to ethnic ancestry. A higher frequency of variant CYP2C8 and CYP2C9 alleles is expected among Caucasian Americans with South European ancestry than in individuals with North European ancestry. The findings summarized in this review suggest that among individuals with Asian or European ancestry, intraethnic differences in the risk of developing adverse effects with drugs that are CYP2C8 or CYP2C9 substrates are to be expected. In addition, the observed intraethnic variability reinforces the need for proper selection of control subjects and points against the use of surrogate control groups for studies involving association of CYP2C8 or CYP2C9 alleles with adverse drug reactions or spontaneous diseases.     

Earning the model‐minority image: Diverse strategies of economic adaptation by Asian‐American women

Using the 1980 US Population Census data, this article documents the diverse strategies of economic adaptation adopted by a group of working‐age immigrant women: Japanese, Chinese, Filipino, Korean, Indian and Vietnamese. A comparable sample of non‐Hispanic white women serves as the reference group. Striking heterogeneity in the individual and collective resources of these groups, together with differences in labour market opportunities and historical context of immigration, have led to a variety of patterns of labour force participation and methods of income attainment. In order to move beyond the oversimplified image of Asian‐Americans as a model minority in their economic success, the article applies four different theories to the census data ‐ assimilation, dual economy, ethnic‐enclave economy and middleman minority. The article closes with a discussion of theoretical implications and methodological suggestions for future studies concerning labour force position and economic adaptation of minority and immigrant women.