In 2023, Associate Professor of Psychology and Director of the ¡Chévere! Lab Roberto L. Abreu received a National Institutes of Health (NIH), Community Partnerships to Advance Science for Society (ComPASS) Program, to fund a five-year research project on health disparities in Miami-Dade County’s LGBTQ+ community. Now, less than a year later, he has been awarded a second NIH grant to fund another research project, totaling $2.6 million over the next five years. Abreu will join forces with researchers Russell B. Toomey and Norma Perez-Brena at the University of Arizona, Karina Gattamora at the University of Miami, and Kirsten Gonzalez at the University of Tennessee. Knoxville.
Roberto Abeu. Photo by Michel Thomas.
The team’s goal with this study is to examine how family relationships, guided by cultural factors, collectively predict mental health outcomes among Latinx LGBTQ+ youth and their parents. To accomplish this, they will work with two established Latinx immigrant destinations in the U.S, one in Florida and one in Arizona, in order to find the factors that impact these relationships the most. These factors include cultural gender norms, religion, spirituality, and the level of hostility in their environments, such as racism, xenophobia, or sexism. With this data, the team aims to create a system that will help understand levels of acceptance within these communities, which would help clinical mental health providers create more targeted, culturally mindful family-level interventions.
While the ¡Chévere! Lab has conducted similar studies on these parent and child relationships in the past, this study will be among the first to use a novel approach to understand the role of Latinx cultural factors on the mental health of Latinx LGBTQ+ youth and their parents. This unique focus on Latinx culture means that the team will be taking into account the effects of traditional cultural values, beliefs, and traditions specific to Latinx communities. For example, the study will identity similarities and differences between how Latinx LGBTQ+ youth and their parents perceive that gender norms and sense of family cohesion influence their understanding of LGBTQ identity and, ultimately, their family relationship.
“Our findings will reveal unique strengths and barriers in Latinx families with LGBTQ youth that will help us design future interventions for community and clinical providers,” Abreu explained.
Work like this is imperative to the mission of the ¡Chévere! Lab, which is to study how marginalized groups deal with and resist oppression and to promote collective well-being, with a focus on Latinx LGBTQ+ people and their families and communities. While this study is the latest to receive funding, Abreu hopes that it will not be the last. He is already planning to submit another NIH grant proposal soon, this one focusing on the barriers, supports, and health outcomes of transgender and gender diverse (TGD) youth whose parents seek services for their child.
“As a Latinx queer person, this work is not only academically important to me, but also deeply personal,” said Abreu. “I do not know where I would be today if it was not for the support that my parents have always shown me since I came out at the age of 16. Without a shred of a doubt, their unconditional love and support has been the foundation of all of my successes. Our shared love and understanding has made us a stronger family; and this is something I want every Latinx LGBTQ+ person and their families to experience.”
