Page 10 - Anti-Racism Pocketbook for Schools and Academies
P. 10
The Impact of Racism on Ethnically Diverse Staff and Customers
Experiencing racism and inequality as an ethnically diverse
individual can have an extremely negative effect; experiencing
racism is associated with poor mental health and, to a lesser
extent, poor physical health. There is considerable research to
suggest that the stress associated with experiencing racism can
have long lasting physical effects.
Stress can elevate blood pressure and weaken the immune
system, which, in turn, raises the risk of developing long-term
health conditions.
Racism is associated with higher rates of stress, increasing an
ethnically diverse person’s risk of developing high blood pressure.
Ethnically diverse people are more likely to have hypertension
than any other racial or ethnic group.
Stress as a result of racism can also lead to behaviours that may
cause further risk to physical health. For example, research has
found that discrimination is linked to higher rates of smoking,
alcohol use, drug use, and unhealthful eating habits.
A 2019 study found that racist experiences appear to
increase inflammation in ethnically diverse people, raising their
risk of developing chronic conditions such as heart disease and
kidney disease.
Another study (Ong & Williams) found that unfair treatment of
ethnically diverse people has a significant consequential effect on
sleep and physiological functioning in midlife.
Racism can lead to mental health problems such as psychosis and
depression. After surveying 5,000 people in 2019, Stephen Ashe
identified that half of the ethnically diverse people interviewed
felt that racism had negatively impacted on their ability to do
their job, and another half were subjected to ‘verbal abuse and
racist jokes’.
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