The Role of Parents in Defining Collective Identity of Arab Adolescents in Israel

Arab adolescents in Israel must form a collective identity while living in both a social context that tends to vilify their existence and in a traditional family context that generally shuns modern Israeli society. The authors examined the relationship between perceptions of parental political socialization and the formation of collective identity among 1,241 Arab adolescents living in Israel. The findings suggest that Israeli Arab adolescents' perception of parental political (religious, national Arab-Palestinian, and Israel civic) socialization is statistically associated with the collective identity of adolescents. As hypothesized, parental political socialization mediated the relationship between parent-adolescent relationship quality and adolescents' collective identity. The results indicate a correlation between parental political socialization and collective identity of adolescents. The discussion focuses on the special place of family in the social context of ethno-religious minorities in a country where the majority perceives the minority as an enemy that endangers the existence of the state.