Content area
The purpose of the study was to explore the impact of stigmatization and discrimination-related psychosocial risk and stress and their relationship to the mental health status of a marginalized group of Filipino Amerasians in Luzon. A sample of 16 mixed-parentage adolescent and young adult Anglo and African Amerasians, who had been abandoned by U.S. servicemen fathers when the Department of Defense (DOD) withdrew its military bases from the Philippines in 1992, helped to answer research questions about how their situations affected their mental health. The conceptual framework was Fanon's theory of colonial psychological oppression in a multiple-case study research design. The data-gathering instruments included a semistructured, researcher-designed interview guide to generate personal narratives and the Depression Anxiety Stress Scales to measure depression, anxiety, and stress. Qualitative cross-case analysis identified multiple psychosocial risk factors, including alcohol and drug abuse, poverty, and homelessness. Many factors were stigma related, including exposure to biracial tension and violence, name-calling, abandonment despair, identity confusion, and derivative family strain. Over half the sample (62.5%) scored severe levels of anxiety, depression, and stress. Social change implications include the need for more emphasis by the DOD on preventing negative consequences for local inhabitants and their children conceived with U.S. servicemen during extended deployments. We need more research and more effective policies, global partners, and interventions to protect the public health, mental health, and social welfare of mixed-American offspring born during such deployments.