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Abstract
The United States has a long history of systemic racism against Black Americans that persists into today, causing Black individuals to experience disproportionate levels of life stress across socioecological levels. These stressors have been associated with negative health outcomes, leading to health inequities among Black Americans. Despite this, Black Americans have demonstrated significant resilience, drawing from sources of strength and support that promote positive health outcomes. The purpose of this dissertation is to foreground the resilience of Black Americans while also acknowledging the impacts of systemic racism on health. Specifically, I use multidimensional frameworks to examine promotive factors (i.e., factors that may predict positive health in the face of stress) in three studies. Study 1 examined the univariate and multivariate effects of individual-, relational-, and community-level promotive factors on the health of a sample of Black adults living in the rural South. Results from this study revealed both univariate and multivariate effects on health, suggesting that these different promotive factors may independently accumulate to predict positive health outcomes. Study 2 used the same sample of Black adults as Study 1 to assess how pre-existing stressors and resources impacted individuals’ experiences of stress and health during the COVID-19 pandemic, an extreme, unexpected stressor. Results from this study demonstrated that Black individuals’ health significantly worsened after the onset of the pandemic and showed how pre-pandemic resources were associated with less stress and more positive health outcomes during the pandemic. Finally, Study 3 examined the effects of a responsive parenting intervention, a constructed resilience factor, on postpartum depressive symptoms among a sample of first-time Black mothers. Results from this study indicated that among mothers reporting clinically significant depressive symptoms at 1 week postpartum, those who received the responsive parenting intervention experienced sharper initial declines in their depressive symptoms compared to those who received a safety control intervention. Taken together, results from these studies highlight the importance of using a multidimensional lens to examine Black Americans’ resilience and suggest avenues for researchers to combat the effects of systemic racism across socioecological levels.