Perceived Stigmatization, Ingroup Pride, and Immune and Endocrine Activity: Evidence From a Community Sample of Black and Latina Women

Racial disparities are a major public health concern in the United States. The authors examined whether Black and Latina community members ’ perceptions of stigmatization and personal feelings about their group relate to immune and endocrine markers associated with health risk, including the cytokine interleukin-6 (IL-6), which coordinates the immune response to infec-tion, the anabolic hormone dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA), which promotes cellular resilience, and the catabolic hormone cortisol, which releases metabolic stores in response to threat. Greater perceived stigmatization was associated with higher basal IL-6, whereas greater ingroup pride was related to elevated basal DHEA. These associations remained with adjustment for general perceived stress, experience with discrimination, age, and income. No significant perceived stigmatization or ingroup pride effects emerged for basal cortisol. These findings provide new evidence that perceived stigmatization and ingroup pride are linked to indicators of disease and resilience, respectively, highlighting mechanisms through which racial and ethnic stigmatization may con-tribute to health disparities. Keywords racial and ethnic health disparities, perceived stigmatization, DHEA, IL-6, ingroup pride, cortisol In the United States, members of racial and ethnic minority groups are at a substantially greater risk for stress-related health problems than those in the White majority (American Cancer Society, 2011; Centers for Disease Control and Preven-tion, 2011). These group-based health disparities have tradi-tionally been explained by societal inequalities, such as differences in socioeconomic status and access to quality health care (for a review, see Williams & Collins, 1995). More recently, however, several investigators have theorized that the psychological experience of belonging to a racial or ethnic group that is stigmatized by society may also contribute t