Harvard University, Harvard School of Public Health, Department of Society, Human Development, and Health, Landmark Center, 4th floor, 401 Park Dr., Boston, MA 02215, USA.
Soc Sci Med. 2011 Nov;73(10):1551-60. doi: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2011.07.026. Epub 2011 Aug 27.
Previous work suggests that regional variation in pre-migration exposure to racism and discrimination, measured by a region's racial composition, predicts differences in individual-level health among black immigrants to the United States. We exploit data on both region and country of birth for black immigrants in the United States and methodology that allows for the identification of arrival cohorts to test whether there are sending country differences in the health of black adults in the United States that support this proposition. While testing this hypothesis, we also document heterogeneity in health across arrival cohorts and by duration of U.S. residence among black immigrants. Using data on working-age immigrant and U.S.-born blacks taken from the 1996-2010 waves of the March Current Population Survey, we show that relative to U.S.-born black adults, black immigrants report significantly lower odds of fair/poor health. After controlling for relevant social and demographic characteristics, immigrants' cohort of arrival, and immigrants' duration in the United States, our models show only modest differences in health between African immigrants and black immigrants who migrate from the other major sending countries or regions. Results also show that African immigrants maintain their health advantage over U.S.-born black adults after more than 20 years in the United States. In contrast, black immigrants from the Caribbean who have been in the United States for more than 20 years appear to experience some downward health assimilation. In conclusion, after accounting for relevant factors, we find that there are only modest differences in black immigrant health across countries of origin. Black immigrants appear to be very highly selected in terms of good health, although there are some indications of negative health assimilation for black immigrants from the Caribbean.
先前的研究表明，以地区种族构成来衡量的移民前经历的种族主义和歧视的区域性差异，预测了美国黑人移民个体健康水平的差异。我们利用美国黑人移民的地区和出生国数据，以及可以识别到达队列的方法，来检验美国黑人成年人口健康状况是否存在支持这一观点的来源国差异。在检验这一假设的同时，我们还记录了不同到达队列和美国居住时间长短的黑人移民的健康状况的异质性。利用来自 1996 年至 2010 年美国当代人口调查（March Current Population Survey）的成年移民和美国出生黑人的数据，我们发现与美国出生的黑人成年人相比，黑人移民报告的健康状况不佳（即健康自评差/极差）的可能性要低得多。在控制了相关的社会人口特征、移民的到达队列和移民在美国的居住时间后，我们的模型显示，非洲移民和来自其他主要来源国或地区的黑人移民之间的健康状况只有很小的差异。结果还表明，非洲移民在美国居住 20 多年后，仍然保持着相对于美国出生黑人成年人的健康优势。相比之下，在美国居住 20 多年的加勒比黑人移民似乎经历了一些健康同化的下降。总之，在考虑到相关因素后，我们发现黑人移民的健康状况在来源国之间只有很小的差异。尽管有一些迹象表明加勒比黑人移民的健康状况出现了负面同化，但黑人移民在健康方面的选择似乎非常严格。
