Examining longitudinal associations between ethnic-racial identity, perspective-taking, and prosocial motivation in adolescents

Adolescence represents a critical developmental period for identity formation and perspective-taking that support positive interpersonal behaviors such as prosocial motivation. Although prior work has linked stronger ethnic-racial identity with volunteerism and the ability to understand other perspectives (Armenta et al., 2011; Cirimele et al., 2024; Knight et al., 2016), relatively less is known about the developmental associations between ethnic-racial identity, perspective-taking, and prosocial motivation. The present longitudinal study aimed to address this gap to test whether earlier ethnic-racial identity is linked to later prosocial motivation and whether perspective-taking during early to middle adolescence mediates this link. To address these questions, 560 adolescents (ages 10.4 - 14.1 years) were assessed annually across four years beginning in 6th and 7th grade, of which they completed a set of self-report questionnaires that included examining ethnic-racial identity, perspective-taking, and prosocial motivation. We tested whether ethnic-racial identity earlier in adolescence was associated with prosocial motivation three years later, and whether perspective-taking in early to middle adolescence mediated the link between ethnic-racial identity and prosocial motivation. Results suggest that adolescents who had a strong sense of ethnic-racial identity in their early adolescent years reported significant prosocial motivation three years later. In addition, results suggest that perspective-taking fully mediated the association between these two variables. Findings provide novel insight on associations between ethnic-racial identity and prosocial motivation as well as perspective-taking as a potential mechanism that could explain the link between the two.