Identity Development in Biracial Children

Beth Leibson-Hawkins & Robert Leibson-Hawkins

The cultural/ethnic identity of biracial individuals has long been a social and political concern; as the U.S. biracial population grows, it is of increasing salience. Much of the concern has involved children with one African American and one European American parent. Because of this social and historical relevance, biracial children here refers to children with one African American and one European American parent. With minority group populations growing approximately 12 times faster than the White population, the United States is becoming increasingly racially diverse. At the same time, the population of biracial people is on the rise. The U.S. Census Bureau acknowledged the increasingly mixed heritage of the country when it added the option to select more than one racial category to the main survey instrument of the 2000 Census. This addition was a huge step forward for a country that traditionally followed the “one drop rule,” wherein if an ...

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