The case for cultural connectedness

A recent report generated from a Growing Up in New Zealand (GUiNZ) survey of 1,224 rangatahi Māori aged 11-12 found:

Cultural connectedness was associated with fewer depression symptoms, anxiety symptoms and better quality of life. 

That sounds cut and dry. But further into the report the following appears:

Cultural connectedness is important for mental wellbeing, however it may not support depression and anxiety symptoms and quality of life in exactly the same way.

Meaning?

The group of children was divided into three sub-groups determined by their degree of ‘structural disadvantage’ (material hardship, severe housing deprivation/homelessness, and food insecurity): persistently low, intermittently high and persistently high.

The following chart shows the greater the cultural connectedness is (horizontal axis) the higher the anxiety symptoms are (vertical axis) for the persistently low (yellow) and persistently high (blue) disadvantaged groups.

(Left click on image to enlarge.)

There is no attempt by the authors of the paper to explain why this may be the case. What they do say is, “…the paper makes an important contribution by exploring whether cultural connectedness buffers the harms caused by structural disadvantage on rangatahi mental wellbeing.”

Based on the above finding cultural connectedness exacerbates the harm, at least in respect of anxiety symptoms.  

The relationships between disadvantage and a/depression and b/ quality of life are also explored showing positive correlations BUT:

… none of these relationships were significant, indicating that cultural connectedness did not have a buffering effect on depression symptoms. There was also no significant buffering effect of cultural connectedness on quality of life scores for rangatahi Māori.

Obviously disappointed in what they describe as “mixed evidence” the authors suggest, “this finding is not surprising as it would be unreasonable to expect that having a strong sense of identity and feelings of belonging in early adolescence might undo generations of harm caused by colonialism and racism and the multiple and interacting structural disadvantages that play out in the lives of rangatahi Māori.”

Having established cultural connectedness has no demonstrable usefulness as a buffer against adolescent depression or anxiety the authors then change tack and argue another reason for its importance:

Achieving the government’s vision … requires actions that will enable rangatahi Māori to develop a strong cultural connectedness not as a resilience or coping strategy but rather as part of a broader Treaty-compliant, pro-equity, anti-racist and human rights-based approach. Anti-racism action will require a commitment to invest in strategies that will systematically dismantle the structures that contribute to inequities in rangatahi Māori mental wellbeing (1,21). This paper provides new insights into the powerful potential of policies that address structural disadvantage and enable rangatahi Māori to flourish in their identity as Māori.

The paper provides nothing of the sort.

What it does provide is evidence that the GUiNZ study has been captured by politicised academics pushing their own racist agenda.

The future funding for GUiNZ is currently under a question mark. According to RNZ, “The current uncertainty over funding for the study comes amid wider fears about science funding.”

Science? You be the judge.