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Quality of Life and Psychological Well-Being in a Bicultural Latino Community

Caribbean Center for Advanced Studies

Ricardo F. Munoz

Guillermo Bernal

James L. Sorensen

University of California, San Francisco

A telephone survey was made of 270 randomly selected adults of Hispanic origin to determine the characteristics of welladjusted "Latinos" residing within San Francisco's Mission District, a bicultural/bilingual urban milieu. Five areas were investigated: (a) sample demographics, (b) acculturation, (c) quality of life components, (d) psychological well-being, and (e) depression levels. Latinos of 18 national origins were represented. The best-adjusted Latinos (satisfied with their lives and subjectively happy) were bicultural, although oriented more toward the Latino culture than the Anglo culture. The sample quality of life depended upon determiners similar to that of the United States mainstream culture: family, work, having children, physical health, education, spouse relationship, and religion. However, the determiners of their satisfaction were discrepant from those of a national sample. Levels of overall psychological well-being were not significantly different for the Latinos when compared to national samples. However, depression levels and negative affect were higher than those reported for non-Latino samples. Utilizing input from the Latino community itself in order to construct a definition of psychological adjustment facilitated the development of a culturally sensitive scale of psychological adjustment. The well-adjusted Latinos when compared to the least well-adjusted Latinos had (a) better paying jobs, (b) a better education, (c) more years lived in the United States, and (d) higher levels of acculturation.

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