The Nigerian-American immigration experience: overcoming adversity through resilence.

Nigerian-Americans are a fast-growing population in the United States, when compared to other immigrant groups. Despite growing numbers there is limited empirical research examining pathways that facilitate success among this immigrant population. This study addresses the dearth in literature by proposing and testing a modified ABCX model of family resilience among Nigerian-Americans. It is hypothesized that similar to other immigrant, and racial/ethnic minority groups in the United States, NigerianAmericans employ protective factors such as ethnic identity and resilience to buffer the effects of acculturative stress and perceived discrimination on well-being and psychological distress. Regression analyses suggest some consistency with the literature, with acculturative stress negatively predicting levels of psychological distress, and positively predicting psychological well-being, but not a significant predictor of relational well-being. Perceived discrimination was not a significant predictor of outcome variables in this study, ethnic identity was a positive predictor of relational well-being (p , iv but not a significant predictor of psychological well-being, and psychological distress. Furthermore, resilience measured as an individual construct was predictive of psychological well-being, and relational well-being, but was not a predictor of psychological distress. However, resilience measured as a multidimensional construct was a significant predictor of all outcome variables in the present study. Exploratory moderated mediation in Amos indicate the ABCX model was unable to explain the relationships between study variables. Implications and study limitations are discussed