Moving Toward More Conclusive Measures of Sociocultural Adaptation for Ethnically Diverse Adolescents in England

This study is part of a larger initiative toward understanding the acculturation of immigrant adolescents using the Longitudinal Study of Young People in England 2004-2010 database. A necessary step in using a database for cross-ethnic comparisons is first to verify whether its items and scales are equivalent. I examined item- and scale-level differential functioning (DF; n = 4,663, six ethnic minority groups) on four of the database’s sociocultural scales: Feelings About School (11 items), Relational Family Efficacy (four items), Being Bullied (five items), and Perceived Teacher Discrimination (four items) using an item response theory (IRT)–based framework. Findings demonstrated no meaningful DF on items and, in most cases, scales as well. Second, distinct ethnic group patterns are present. Third, the Perceived Teacher Discrimination scale was not functioning for the majority of the ethnic minority groups which is of grave concern. Implications for future comparative studies and immigration policy makers are discussed.