Same-Race Friendships and School Attachment: Demonstrating the Interaction Between Personal Network and School Composition

  1. White students showed the strongest attachment to school, Black students showed the weakest and

    Asians and Hispanic students were in between.

  2. Compared to White and Black students, Hispanic and Asian students had lower proportions of same-race friends, mainly because they make up a smaller proportion of the student body in many schools.
  3. Proportion of same-race friends was positively associated with school attachment. The relationship between friendship, racial composition and school attachment was similar across racial groups (when school composition was not considered).
  4. Proportion of Black peers had a significantly more positive association with school attachment with

    Black students than with White students.

  5. The main effect of school composition was small or nonexistent once friendship composition was

    taken into account.

  6. The relationship between same-race friendships and school attachment was more positive when

    the racial group makes up a higher proportion of the student body for Asian students, this pattern did

    not appear for Black or Hispanic students.

  7. There is a significantly positive relationship between proportion of same-race friends and school

    attachment in the overall sample. This relationship was not any stronger for Whites than for non-

    Whites.