Race/Ethnicity and Family Contact

Research from several disciplines has found that Latinos in the United States tend to score higher than other groups on measures of familialism. While most studies of Latino familialism use attitudinal measures rather than behavioral ones, I argue that examining behavioral measures of familialism can offer additional insights. This article develops a behavioral measure of familialism based on frequency of contact with family members and demonstrates this measure’s utility using 2002 General Social Survey (GSS) data. Indices were created representing frequency of contact with nuclear and extended family using individual familial categories (i.e., mother, sibling, cousin). Frequency of contact with the individual familial categories was also tested. Analysis of the indices found that Latinos maintained more frequent contact with nuclear and extended family members than did White non-Hispanics but not Black non-Hispanics. More detailed findings from the analyses of individual familial categories, and suggestions for future research are discussed.