Interracial Relationships

Research Aims This study will attempt to explore interracial relationships’ impact on openness to other cultures. Researchers plan to evaluate individual's openness to other cultures, dating experiences, and attitudes towards interracial dating. Interracial relationships impact on openness to other cultures is a topic that has not been directly explored. Past research on interracial relations and the impact on multicultural sensitivity have been explored and signified a positive correlation. In addition, previous literature indicates that interracial contact can lead to an effective perspective on other cultures. Physical attractiveness is one of the leading factors as it pertains to who we date whether intraracially or interracially dating.
There was an insufficient amount of participants in each condition from the vignettes. A study with internal validity requires 20 or more participants in each condition. The current study consisted of 17 to 18 participants per condition due to the occurrence of participants not identifying as Black or the incompletion of measures. The lack of individuals in each condition might have been a factor resulting to the insignificance of the researcher’s findings. In addition, the deficiency of participants in each condition also cause for the inability to generalize results to the population. Another implication researchers discovered was a Cronbach's alpha score below .80. The present study Cronbach's alpha came out to be .495 and .552 indicating that the measures are not reliable to measure the variables and had relatively low internal
Unlike the current study which relied on college students to observe and assess a relationship between variables. To determine generalizability future studies can observe this relationship outside of a college campus examining a different age group, race, and country. Current research took place at a historically black university. Future research should be conducted at universities with varying degrees of diversity to ascertain if the correlation between interracial dating and openness to other cultures is influenced by the ethnic composition of the school (Hunter &Elias, 2000). Researchers recommend a parental assessment on racial attitudes might benefit present studies quasi experimental design. This would assist in determining if attitudes on interracial dating and the cultural openness score to observe if parental influences represent a confounding variable. By observing parental influences researchers can account for extra factors that influence interracial dating therefore, the study only indicates a relationship between interracial dating and cultural openness. A longitudinal study could be advantageous to indicate if the relationship between interracial dating and cultural openness remain constant throughout an individual's lifespan. By conducting a longitudinal study future studies can directly observe individuals who interracially date and