Views on interracial dating among Chinese and European Canadians: The roles of culture, gender, and mainstream cultural identity

Abstract

The present study examines cross-cultural and gender differences in the norms regarding interracial dating among Chinese and European Canadians. In response to a scenario describing an interracial dating conflict between a young adult and his/her parents, Chinese Canadians gave greater support to parents than did European Canadians, who in turn gave greater support to the young adult than did Chinese Canadians. With regard to self-report measures of views on interracial dating, Chinese Canadian males showed less favorable attitudes towards interracial dating than all other groups and showed less openness to interracial dating than did European Canadian males. Among Chinese Canadians only, endorsement of Canadian identity made a contribution above and beyond family allocentrism to the prediction of all measures assessing views on interracial dating.