Does Teacher-Student Relationship Moderate the Link Between Ethnic Harassment and School Adjustment Among Immigrant Youth?

Abstract: Immigrant students are targets of ethnic harassment in school context in their host country. Prior studies demonstrated that being victim of ethnic harassment has consequences for the psychological, behavioral, and school adjustment of youths with immigrant background. The purpose of this study was to examine if a positive teacher relationship moderated the school adjustment of ethnically harassed immigrant students. Data was gathered from ethnically harassed students in 7th and 8th grade in seven schools of a midsized town in Sweden. In addition to univariate and bivariate correlation analyses, a series of moderated regression analyses were conducted. Significant moderation effects of relationship with teachers were found for two of the school adjustment measures. The results suggested a positive relationship with teachers could play a buffering role for school liking and truancy of students who experience ethnic harassment from their peers. Implications of the findings were discussed in relation to both research and practice.