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Although several studies have documented how social-structural constraints impair psychological functioning, few have considered how race-related structural constraints impair African Americans' psychological functioning. This study focuses on an under-studied form of race-related structural constraints: racial segmentation in the workplace. Specifically, I examine the association between perceived workplace racial segmentation, conceived and assessed from a social psychological perspective, and African Americans' psychological well-being. The magnitude and consistency of the relationship is evaluated across both a national sample and a local probability sample of African Americans. Findings across the two samples indicate a modest but consistent negative relationship between perceived racial segmentation and psychological well-being. In addition, this association remains significant after controlling for perceived discrimination as well as sociodemographic and occupational characteristics. Consistent with prior research on relative deprivation, the adverse influence of perceived racial segmentation on well-being was stronger among higher socioeconomic status African Americans than lower socioeconomic African Americans.
There is a long sociological tradition of studying how social-structural constraints impair psychological functioning (House 1981; House and Mortimer 1990; Kohn 1989; Sorokin 1927). Only recently, however, has research begun to explicitly examine race-related structural constraints and their impact on African Americans' psychological functioning.1 For instance, several recent qualitative studies have explored the social psychological consequences of blocked opportunity in the labor market for African Americans' well-being (Anderson 1999; Collins 1997; Cose 1993; Feagin and McKinney 2003; Feagin and Sikes 1994; Zweigenhaft and Domhoff 1991, 1998, 2003). This work has shown that experiencing blocked opportunity can induce emotional distress, sadness, and feelings of worthlessness, helplessness, and powerlessness among African Americans. For some of this research, an important labor market constraint has been racial segmentation in the workplace. Racial segmentation in the workplace refers to the process whereby many blacks are relegated to the least desirable jobs in terms of prestige, power, and chances for career advancement (see Kaufman 2001). For example, one recent study noted that, despite the fact that increasing numbers of African Americans have white co-workers, "they still tend to work in organizations where many, if not most, of the workers in similar jobs are also African Americans" (Tomaskovic-Devey 1993:3). Unfortunately, the studies that have explored the social psychological consequences of racial segmentation have typically been based upon convenience samples of the...