The Program for Research on Black Americans’ Contributions to Sociology: A Review of the Literature

Abstract

This article has three goals. The first is to explain the contributions of the Program for Research on Black Americans (PRBA) to the field of sociology. The second is to provide a review of the scope of research conducted by PRBA scholars. This review covers research on Black families, marriage and romantic relationships, racial socialization, interpersonal violence, negative interactions, religious participation and spirituality, religion and mental health, social support, social isolation, mental and physical health, racism and discrimination, colorism, and Black politics. It also covers research on African American and Black Caribbean adolescents, adults, and older adults. The third goal of the article is a bibliometric analysis of National Survey of American Life (NSAL)–based publications including citation analysis, analysis of which journals have published the most NSAL-based articles, and authorship network analysis. The article ends with a brief discussion of our most recent data collection and a conclusion. The article shows that the PRBA, through its research, mentoring, and longevity, has met the criteria of Wright and Thomas’s principles of Black sociology.

The Program for Research on Black Americans (PRBA) has had a major impact on the quality and quantity of survey-based research on Black Americans. The PRBA is a highly interdisciplinary group with researchers in multiple disciplines (psychology, sociology) and professional schools (public health, social work; Chatters et al. 2023). Data from the PRBA have resulted in more than 1,000 peer-reviewed articles, 100 dissertations, and several books and edited books. In addition to work produced by people formally affiliated with the PRBA, researchers across the United States and globally have accessed the PRBA datasets through the Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR) at the Institute for Social Research. The goal of this article is to discuss the contributions that PRBA has made to Black sociology and, in doing so, provide a sense of the scope of research conducted by PRBA scholars.

The article begins with a brief description of the two PRBA data sets that have been the most utilized—the National Survey of Black Americans (NSBA) and the National Survey of American Life (NSAL). We then discuss how the work of the PRBA reflects the principles of Black sociology as outlined in Wright and Thomas’s (2006) classic work. Following this, we provide a brief overview of published research from the PRBA. Given the large number and scope of these works, this overview is necessarily brief and mostly lists the papers so that scholars can go to the original material. We next provide a bibliometric analysis of NSAL data including citation analysis, analysis of which journals have published the most NSAL-based articles, and authorship network analysis. The article ends with a brief discussion of our most recent data collection and a conclusion.

PRBA AND THE PRINCIPLES OF BLACK SOCIOLOGY

The PRBA was established in 1976. Over the 50 years of its existence, the PRBA has pursued the goal of research for and about Black populations that reflects the principles of Black sociology as outlined by Wright and Thomas (2006) and later expanded upon by Ojeh (Ojeh, Brooks, and Wright 2024). Below we first provide the principles of Black sociology (in italics) and discuss how PRBA’s work has met those principles.

1. The research is conducted primarily, but not exclusively, by Black scholars. The vast majority of the PRBA’s students, post-docs, and faculty have been African American. See Table 1 for a listing of sociologists who were trained by PRBA.

2. The research focuses on and centers the experiences of Black folks. The PRBA conducted the first national probability study of Black Americans in the United States (National Survey of Black Americans [NSBA]), and the majority of its research focuses on Black Americans, with an emphasis on within-group diversity within this population. See Chatters et al. (2023:414–17) for a more detailed discussion of this issue.

3. The research efforts are interdisciplinary. The PRBA has always been highly interdisciplinary, with scholars from various fields and research published in sociology, psychiatry, psychology, political science, economics, social work, gerontology, family studies, and public health. See Table 2 in Chatters et al. (2023) for a listing of PRBA alumni in various fields.

4. The research findings, whenever possible but not required, are generalizable beyond Black Americans. Numerous studies using the NSAL were combined with other Collaborative Psychiatric Epidemiology Surveys data sets (see Jackson et al. 2004 for a discussion of this issue) and are generalizable to the U.S. population. Additionally, the PRBA has made important theoretical and methodological contributions that are generalizable to other populations. This is most apparent in research using the everyday and major discrimination scales, which have been used in research in numerous populations, including Asian Americans, Latinx, Native Americans, and Pacific Islanders.

5. The research findings produce data that should have social policy implications. Much of the research produced by PRBA scientists or others using PRBA data has important policy and practice implications. This is especially the case for the numerous papers on the prevalence of psychiatric disorders that produced the first rates of clinical depression, suicidal behaviors, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and other mental health conditions among Black Americans.

6. The research avoids race deficit approaches. The PRBA uses a strength perspective and avoids deficit and pathological approaches in understanding Black Americans. This was best exemplified by the founder of PRBA, James S. Jackson, and stated in his New York Times obituary (Genzlinger 2020):

   “Social science research is oftentimes problem-focused,” he told the journal Black Issues in Higher Education in 2001. “The questions tend to start from the perspective of asking, ‘What’s wrong with Black people?’ We approach the issues from a very different perspective. Our question is, ‘Given the structural impediments that they face, why do Black people do so well?’”

7. The research centers on the experiences of Black Americans and people of African descent throughout the diaspora. Research conducted by the PRBA includes studies of African Americans, Black Caribbean immigrants, Jamaicans in Kingston, the residents of Guyana, studies comparing African Americans and Blacks in England (Nazroo et al. 2007), as well as Caribbeans across the diaspora—England, the United States, Canada, Guyana, and Jamaica (Lacey et al. 2025). Further, one of the major goals of the PRBA is conducting within-group research so we can learn about diversity within the Black American population, as opposed to between-group research, where the main focus is documenting differences between Black Americans and White Americans.

8. The research implements an interdisciplinary and community-based approach. The interdisciplinary nature of the PRBA was stated previously. Although the vast majority of work from PRBA and other researchers is based on survey data, there is considerable community-based research conducted by the PRBA. The most notable is the work conducted by the Michigan Center for Urban African American Aging Research (MCUAAAR). The MCUAAAR, through its Healthier Black Elders Center, has held numerous year-round community education and health programs for older Black Americans in Detroit and Flint, Michigan. In the calendar year 2024, more than 1,000 older adults attended various outreach and lunch-and-learn events in Detroit and Flint. The lunch-and-learn events addressed issues of protection from scams, managing finances, hearing loss and cognition, digital awareness, healthy eating and movement, glaucoma, nutrition, COVID-19 and flu season, grief and loss, skin care, chronic illness, using proper footwear to improve circulation, and celebrating grandparenting (Perry et al. 2023, 2024; Rorai et al. 2021).

Table 1.

Selected PRBA Sociology Alumni

Name	Rank/Academic Position	University
Clifford Bromanc	Professor of Sociology	Michigan State
R. Khari Browna,e	Professor of Sociology	Wayne State
Tony Browna	Distinguished Professor of Sociology	Rice
Prudence Carterc	Sarah and Joseph Jr. Dowling Professor of Sociology	Brown
Tia Clintonb	Senior Fellow	Center on Reinventing Public Education
Ryon J. Cobbd	Assistant Professor, School of Social Work, Chancellor’s Scholar for Inclusive Excellence in Research on Black Americans	Rutgers
Christina Crossa,b,d	Associate Professor of Sociology	Berkeley
Christy L. Ervingd	Associate Professor, Department of Sociology	Texas-Austin
Michael Espostiob	Assistant Professor, Don A. Martindale Endowed Chair in Sociology	Minnesota
Ivy Forsythe-Brown1	Associate Professor of Sociology	Michigan-Dearborn
Cleothia Frazierd	Assistant Professor of Sociology	Pennsylvania State
Bridget Goosbyc	Professor of Sociology	Texas
Shirley Hatchetta,e	Former Associate Professor of Sociology	Illinois
Mosi Ifatunjic,d	Associate Professor of African American Studies and Sociology	Wisconsin
Rukmalie Jayakodya	Associate Professor of Human Development and Family Studies and Sociology	Penn State
Kimson Johnsona,b	Post-Doctoral Fellow, Institute for Social Research	Michigan
Janice Johnson-Diasc	Associate Professor of Sociology	John Jay College
Nicholas Jonesa	Director/Senior Advisor Race & Ethnic Research and Outreach	U.S. Census Bureau
Krim Laceyc	Associate Professor of African American Studies and Sociology	Michigan-Dearborn
Thomas LaVeista	Dean, School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine	Tulane
L’Heureux Lewis-McCoya	Associate Professor of Sociology and Black Studies	City College of New York
Karen Lincolna	Professor of Public Health	California-Irvine
Ruby Mendenhallc	Kathryn Lee Baynes Dallenbach Professorship Sociology and African American Studies	Illinois
Lewis Milesb	Presidential Postdoctoral Fellowship, Department of Ethnic Studies	University of California, San Diego
Reuben Millerd	Chancellor’s Professor of Sociology	Berkeley
Mignon Moorec	Chair, Department of Sociology	Barnard
Dawne Mouzond	Associate Professor of Sociology	Rutgers
Analidis Ochoaa,b	PhD Candidate, Social Work and Sociology	Michigan
Anna Rileyc	Scientific Review Officer	Center for Scientific Review, NIH
Sherrill Sellersa	Associate Dean for Undergraduate Education	Miami University (Ohio)
Robert Joseph Taylora,c,e	Harold Johnson Endowed Professor of Social Work, Director PRBA	Michigan
David Williams5	Florence Sprague Norman & Laura Smart Norman Professor of Public Health	Harvard
Amanda Woodwarda,e	Professor of Social Work	Michigan State

Notes: Positions with PRBA ^aDoctoral Student, ^bMentoring Group Member, ^cPost-Doc Fellow, ^dMCUAAAR Faculty Scientist, ^eFaculty.

RESEARCH PRODUCED BY THE PRBA

We cannot adequately cover the nuances of the more than 1,000 published papers and several books by PRBA researchers, so our goal is to provide a sense of the scope of the research done by PRBA and using its data sets. We will largely focus on published work using the NSAL as opposed to the older NSBA and the several focus group studies. We emphasize works published by PRBA researchers; however, it is important to note that because the PRBA data sets are public, many other researchers have produced excellent work using PRBA data.

NATIONAL SURVEY OF BLACK AMERICANS (NSBA) AND NATIONAL SURVEY OF AMERICAN LIFE (NSAL)

The NSBA was collected in 1979–1980 and resulted in 2,107 completed interviews (For a more detailed discussion of the NSBA sample, see Jackson 1991.). There were more than 300 articles based on the NSBA. When James S. Jackson established the PRBA, he had several goals and faced several challenges. One of his main goals was to create a research project that involved students in the research process as a learning and training experience. Given this, doctoral students from a number of academic and professional programs were heavily involved in all aspects of the NSBA, including questionnaire development and interviewer training. One of the major substantive and intellectual challenges of the proposed survey was that the sample would exclusively comprise Black respondents. This was an issue because the prevailing belief and practice during this period (and among many today) was that Black people should only be studied in comparison to White people. This created difficulty within the Institute for Social Research and was an impediment to publishing articles in peer-reviewed journals after the data were collected. Further, much of the available research at the time assumed a deficit approach with respect to Black Americans and was primarily focused on the study of social problems, such as unemployment, substance abuse, and child maltreatment. The NSBA, in contrast, did not shy away from studying social problems but instead took a contextually based strengths approach and examined the role of protective factors such as family and friendship social support, religious involvement, and racial identity in understanding these circumstances. See Chatters et al. (2023) for a more detailed discussion of the NSBA’s historical significance.

The NSAL data collection was conducted from February 2001 to June 2003 (see detailed discussion of the NSAL sample in Jackson et al. 2004). The NSAL is part of the Collaborative Psychiatric Epidemiology Surveys (CPES), which consists of three nationally representative surveys: the NSAL, the National Comorbidity Survey Replication, and the National Latino and Asian American Study. Some of the NSAL-published articles use combined NSAL and CPES data, whereas others solely use the NSAL. In addition, the PRBA also collected the NSAL Adolescent Supplement (NSAL-A), which is a supplemental study of adolescents who were attached to adult households from the NSAL. As of December 2025, there were 639 articles and 82 dissertations based on the NSAL adult sample and 76 articles based on the NSAL-A. See Jackson et al. (2004) for a more detailed description of the NSAL and Chatters et al. (2023) for a comparison of the strengths of the NSBA and the NSAL.

Black Caribbeans

The advent of the NSAL marked a major milestone in research on Black Caribbeans in the United States. There had been quite a bit of excellent research on this population. However, the vast majority of this work was qualitative and focused on a single geographical region (Waters 1999) and, in many cases, one immigrant population (Vickerman 2001). The NSAL provided the first large probability-based survey of Black Caribbeans in the United States and, for the first time, provided the opportunity to assess many fundamental issues within this population. For instance, with respect to the sociology of religion, prior to the NSAL, we did not know the basic profile of denominational affiliation of this group, nor did we know what percentage of Black Caribbeans attended weekly religious services, were official members of their place of worship, prayed on a daily basis, or characterized themselves as religious or spiritual. With the NSAL, PRBA researchers conducted numerous studies of both within-group analysis of Black Caribbeans as well as analysis comparing Black Caribbeans, African Americans, and non-Latino White adults. This includes research on suicidal behaviors (Joe et al. 2006), clinical depression (Williams et al. 2007), family relationships (Forsythe-Brown et al. 2017), and racial socialization (Anderson et al. 2023), among many other topics.

The Sociology of Black Families

The PRBA emerged from a period during which Black families were under attack in both research and policy arenas. The impact of the Moynihan Report (Moynihan 1967), which argued that Black families were mired in a “tangle of pathology,” was widely taught, believed, and acted upon in terms of characterizations of and policy related to Black family life. The PRBA, however, took a strength-based approach in their research. The items focused on family life for the NSBA and later for the NSAL were based on both Vern Bengtson’s intergenerational solidarity framework (Bengtson et al. 2002) and Carol Stack’s (1974) qualitative research on Black families. The majority of Black family research produced by the PRBA addressed social support networks of extended family members including research on older adults (R. Taylor, Xiang, et al. 2025), adolescents (Cross 2023), and adults in general (R. Taylor, Chatters, and Cross 2021; see below for more information on PRBA’s social support papers.) Although only a few studies using PRBA data explored single mother households, a recent book by PRBA alumna Christina Cross (2025) represents some of best work on single- and dual-headed African American households. Her book, Inherited Inequality: Why Opportunity Gaps Persist Between Black and White Youth Raised in Two-Parent Families, received the 2026 Eastern Sociological Society Mirra Komarovsky Book Award.

Marriage and Romantic Relationships

Several PRBA articles focus on marital satisfaction (Bryant et al. 2008), including research on older adults (Skipper and Taylor 2021) and comparisons of African American and Black Caribbean marriage and romantic relationships (Lincoln, Taylor, and Jackson 2008). One of the strengths of the NSAL and the NSBA is that people of all ages who were currently unmarried were asked about romantic relationships. There was an assumption in the dating and romantic relationship literature that only young people dated. PRBA faculty published the first articles on romantic relationships among older adults, beginning with the work of Tucker, Taylor, and Mitchell-Kernan (1993) and more recently with the work of Mouzon, Taylor, and Chatters (2020). Study findings indicated that older Black men were more likely to be married and, if not married, were more likely to have a romantic partner. They further found that many older single Black women did not currently have a romantic partner and, in addition, did not want a romantic partner.

Racial Socialization

PRBA researchers have conducted some of the most widely cited papers on racial socialization (Bowman and Howard 1985; Thornton 1997; Thornton et al. 1990). Relative to the very large literature on racial socialization, PRBA researchers have published very few studies; however, they are nonetheless highly influential given that they are the only studies based on national probability samples of African Americans and Black Caribbeans.

Findings from two major studies on racial socialization use the NSAL adolescent survey (NSAL-A) and reveal important similarities as well as within-group differences. T. Brown et al. (2020) found that roughly 9 out of 10 African American and Black Caribbean respondents report having talked to someone about what being Black means. They found that there were no differences in whom African American and Black Caribbean adolescents received messages (i.e., parents, relatives, friends, other adults). A continuation of this research was conducted by Anderson et al. (2023). They found that among African Americans, region was significantly associated with receiving racial socialization messages, whereas among Black Caribbeans, those whose families had higher income were more likely to receive racial socialization messages. Anderson et al. (2023) also found that the most common racial socialization messages for both ethnicities were “to be proud to be Black,” “hard work achieves anything,” and “to keep it real.” Conversely, the least common messages were not to trust Asians and not to trust Whites. Overall, there were few differences in the type of racial socialization messages transmitted to African American and Black Caribbean adolescents.

Problematic Aspects of Black Families

PRBA researchers investigate both the positives as well as the negative aspects of Black family life. This includes research on the numerous types of traumas that lead to PTSD (Gran-Ruaz et al. 2022). For the purpose of this review, we will discuss research on negative interactions and intimate partner violence (IPV; domestic abuse).

Negative interactions.

PRBA scientists have conducted research on negative interactions among family members (e.g., criticisms, overburdening), including both the correlates of negative interactions (Lincoln, Taylor, and Chatters 2013) as well as the impact of negative interactions on mental health (R. Taylor and Chatters 2020). One study of the correlates of negative interactions investigated patterns of receiving emotional support and negative interactions from extended family members (R. Taylor, Forsythe-Brown, et al. 2014). That analysis investigated the correlates of four types of extended family networks: (1) ambivalent networks (high emotional support and high negative interaction); (2) optimal networks (high emotional support and low negative interaction); (3) estranged networks (low emotional support and low negative interaction); and (4) strained networks (low emotional support and high negative interaction). R. Taylor, Forsythe-Brown, et al. (2014) found that among both African Americans and Black Caribbeans, optimal family networks were associated with higher levels of family contact and subjective closeness, and men were more likely than women to report that they were in estranged networks.

Research on the impact of negative interactions on mental health consistently found that negative interactions were correlated with poor mental health and suicidal behaviors (Chatters et al. 2011; R.; Taylor and Chatters 2020). Much of this work examines both the frequency of receiving emotional support as well as receiving negative interactions. Although negative interactions were less frequent than emotional support, negative interactions were much more likely to impact mental health (see review by R. Taylor and Chatters 2020). One of the strengths of the NSAL is that it also included measures of negative interactions with congregational members. This work found that, like any primary group, congregational members can be both sources of support as well as emotional pain (see reviews by Chatters, Joseph Taylor, and Tsuchiya (2025), Chatters et al. (2023), Nguyen (2020), R. Taylor, Kim, et al. (2025), and R. Taylor and Chatters (2020)).

Intimate partner violence (IPV).

An estimated two in five women in the United States encounter acts of IPV, including physical violence, sexual violence, or stalking by a current or former partner during their lifetime (Leemis et al. 2022). Many abused women are at heightened risk for psychological distress, physical injuries, disability, and premature death (Lacey and Mouzon 2016; Lacey et al. 2015; Leemis et al. 2022). The NSAL has been vital to the theoretical and methodological advancements in knowledge about IPV in the lives of Black women. The comprehensive nature of this first-of-its-kind data source has enabled substantive exploration of previously uninvestigated contextual and social factors relevant to Black women’s related experiences and outcomes. The scholarly contributions made possible by the NSAL have allowed for the decolonization of knowledge regarding Black women’s IPV experiences by helping to advance the literature toward more nuanced explanations. The body of literature developed from the NSAL data reflects a common effort to trade historical essentialist epistemologies for those that reflect Black women’s nuanced realities. It has initiated a paradigm shift by allowing for the investigation of victimized women of different ethnic backgrounds.

Another important contribution to the literature due to the NSAL has been the increased understanding of a broad range of mental and physical conditions to which victimized Black women are vulnerable (Lacey and Mouzon 2016; Lacey et al. 2015). Furthermore, it has allowed for the recentering of Black women’s agency in the IPV literature and discourse on how they perceive and respond to IPV. IPV research on Black women has often focused on the actions of the harm doer and the consequences that women suffer from abuse. This tendency may inform the misperception that women who experience abuse are merely passive actors. The NSAL data allowed for the first population-level studies of diverse Black women’s help-seeking perceptions and practices (Lacey, Jiwatram-Negron, and Powell Sears 2021).

Key to advancing the discourse on U.S. Black women’s experiences with IPV was the utilization of the NSAL to provide confirmation about speculated differences between and within ethnic/racial groups, unmasking the common “one-size-fits-all” assumptions (Lacey et al. 2016; Parnell, Lacey, and Wood 2022). An important addition to the literature is the expansion of potential risk factors associated with IPV and other adverse health outcomes, including neighborhood context (e.g., violence exposure) and stressful structural conditions (e.g., racial discrimination) among U.S. Black women (Lacey et al. 2015, 2016; Lacey et al. 2020; Lacey et al. 2021; Lacey, Shahid, and Jeremiah 2021). Another highlight surrounds the deleterious effects of IPV on an extensive list of health conditions, and the noted differences between African Americans and Caribbean Black women, which has drawn attention to cultural factors in response, coping, and the help-seeking behavior of women who have traumatic IPV experiences (Lacey, Jiwatram-Negron, and Powell Sears 2021; Lacey and Mouzon 2016; Parnell, Lacey, and Wood 2022). Finally, the exploration of these dynamics among a growing, but relatively under-researched Caribbean population has been monumental to our understanding of the role of migratory factors, contextual differences, and generational status in risk and consequences of intimate partner victimization (Lacey et al. 2021).

The Sociology of African American Religion

African American religious participation

Before the advent of the PRBA and the NSBA, in particular, extremely little quantitative research focused on African American religious participation. The research that existed embodied a deficit perspective (i.e., framing the higher levels of religious participation among African Americans versus White adults as a weakness). PRBA research examined the correlates of a large variety of public and private religious indicators, including church attendance, reading religious materials, watching or listening to religious media, prayer, religious coping, and the use of ministers for mental health and other problems. This research involved samples across the adult age range (e.g., R. Taylor, Chatters, and Brown 2014), older adults (Taylor, Chatters, and Jackson 2007), and adolescents (e.g., R. Taylor, Nguyen, and Tsuchiya 2026). Taking advantage of the large NSAL sample size, the studies on adults examined differences in religious participation using customary demographic factors (i.e., age, gender, income, education, region), as well as several novel social correlates (e.g., incarceration history, cohabitation, remarriage, welfare history, military service; R. Taylor, Chatters, and Khari Brown 2014). See discussion of adolescent religious participation later in this article, and also see R. Taylor, Kim, et al. (2025) for more detailed information about research on religion among African Americans and Black Caribbeans.

Spirituality

PRBA researchers also conducted important research on spirituality (Hope et al. 2024) that investigated the correlates of spirituality as well as examined the interface between spirituality and religiosity. For example, Chatters et al.’s (2008) study of the correlates of patterns of subjective religiosity and spirituality (i.e., religious only, spiritual only, both religious and spiritual, and neither religious nor spiritual) found that African Americans and Caribbean Blacks were more likely than non-Hispanic Whites to indicate that they are “both religious and spiritual” and less likely to indicate that they are “spiritual only” or “neither spiritual nor religious.” In particular, 81.2 percent of African Americans characterized themselves as being both spiritual and religious, followed by 76.9 percent of Black Caribbeans and 62.9 percent of non-Latino Whites.

Religion and mental health

PRBA researchers also investigated the impact of religion on mental health, including studies of religion and depression (R. Taylor, Chatters, and Joe 2011), religion and suicidal behaviors (R. Taylor, Chatters, and Abelson 2012), religion and obsessive-compulsive disorder (Himle, Taylor, and Chatters 2012), and religion and anxiety disorders (Hodge et al. 2022; Nguyen et al. 2024). For example, Nguyen et al. (2024) found that in some cases, religious involvement is associated with less persistent anxiety disorders and less severe impairments related to those disorders, whereas in other cases, it is linked to more persistent and impairing forms of anxiety disorders. These findings underscore Black Americans’ use of religion both as a resource to promote mental well-being and a means of coping with the distress associated with anxiety disorders (Nguyen et al. 2024). A more in-depth discussion of these studies and other religion and mental health studies can be found in several review articles (Chatters et al. 2023; Nguyen 2020; R. Taylor, Kim, et al. 2025; R. Taylor and Chatters 2020).

The Sociology of Kin and Non-Kin Supportive Relationships

Social support

PRBA has produced a tremendous amount of research on social support. As noted earlier, most of this research on Black families has addressed extended families as sources of social support. PRBA researchers wrote some of the first major quantitative and qualitative studies examining informal, church-based social support networks (see R. Taylor, Kim, et al. 2025; R. Taylor, Chatters, and Levin 2004). This work addressed emotional support (Lincoln, Taylor, and Jackson 2008), instrumental support (Cross et al. 2018), reciprocal support (R. Taylor et al. 2016), the interface between family and church support (Nguyen, Chatters, and Taylor 2016), and the interface between informal and professional support for mental health problems (Woodward et al. 2008). PRBA researchers wrote the first quantitative studies of fictive kinship networks, including fictive kin relations of adults (R. Taylor et al. 2022) and older adults (Nguyen 2017). See Chatters, Joseph Taylor, and Tsuchiya (2025) for a detailed review of the NSAL-based social support articles.

Social support and mental health

NSAL data have been used to examine the impact of social support (family support and church-based informal support) on a variety of mental health outcomes. Research on family support and mental health includes research on suicidal behaviors, clinical depression, clinical anxiety, and depressive symptoms (see Chatters et al. 2023). Studies of the impact of church-based social support on mental health problems (Chatters et al. 2011; Nguyen et al. 2022) includes the combined impact of family and church support on depressive symptoms (Chatters et al. 2018), as well as recent research indicating that church support can buffer against the harmful effects of racial discrimination and reduce the risk for Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM; Nguyen et al. 2022). These findings demonstrate that church support is an important and effective resource for coping with racial discrimination. See review articles by Chatters et al. (2023), Nguyen (2020), R. Taylor, Kim, et al. (2025), and R. Taylor and Chatters (2020) for detailed discussions of this research.

Social isolation

Due to the pandemic, the societal problem of social isolation and loneliness has received renewed attention. PRBA researchers have published work that examines both the prevalence of social isolation as well as the degree to which social isolation is associated with mental and physical health problems. One measure of social isolation focused on the degree of isolation from the two most important primary groups, family and friends. This research found that objective isolation (as defined by the lack of contact) from family and friends is associated with numerous negative outcomes, including depressive symptoms (R. Taylor et al. 2020), psychiatric problems (Nguyen et al. 2020), self-rated physical and oral health (H. Taylor et al. 2024), hypertension (Hamler et al. 2025), and three different indicators of pain (Baker et al. 2022).

Several NSAL studies on social isolation used a modified version of the standard Lubben social network scale (see review by H. Taylor et al. 2025) that had several advantages over the standard scales of social isolation. One advantage is that other scales normally do not measure interactions with congregational members, and the few that do use religious service attendance as a proxy for whether one is socially isolated. In contrast, the NSAL objective isolation scale directly measures interaction with congregation members, a critical difference because some individuals who attend religious services regularly may not have friends in their congregation or regularly interact with fellow congregants. Similarly, some scales of social isolation assume that adults who are not married are not in a romantic relationship. The NSAL measure assesses whether an individual is unmarried and further asks if they are in a cohabiting relationship or involved in a romantic relationship. In an analysis among older adults, R. Taylor, Chatters, and Taylor (2019) found that among African Americans, being female and residing in the South were protective against objective isolation. See H. Taylor et al. (2025) for a review of this research.

Research published in this special issue (H. Taylor, Nguyen, and Tsuchiya 2026) demonstrates why it is important to include congregation members in social isolation measures. H. Taylor, Nguyen, and Tsuchiya (2026) examined whether hearing and vision impairments are associated with objective isolation and subjective isolation from family, friends, and congregational networks. As anticipated, vision impairment was associated with a greater likelihood of being subjectively isolated from family and friends and a greater likelihood of being objectively isolated from friends. However, individuals with vision impairment were less likely to be objectively and subjectively isolated from congregational members than their non-vision-impaired counterparts (H. Taylor, Nguyen, and Tsuchiya 2026). These findings, in conjunction with other work (R. Taylor, Chatters, and Taylor 2019), indicate that congregational networks comprise socially meaningful relationships that should be included when measuring social isolation.

The Sociology of African American Mental Health and Psychiatric Disorders

Prevalence of psychiatric disorders and mental health problems

NSAL data allowed for the first-ever major prevalence studies of psychiatric disorders among African Americans and Black Caribbeans, including depression (Williams et al. 2007), suicidal behaviors (Joe et al. 2006), eating disorders (J. Taylor et al. 2007), anxiety disorders (Himle et al. 2009; Williams et al. 2017), post-traumatic stress disorder (Alegría et al. 2013), psychotic experience (Earl et al. 2015), and obsessive-compulsive behavior (Himle et al. 2008). The research team of Mays et al. (2018) and Jones et al. (2020) published two of the most comprehensive studies of psychiatric disorders using the NSAL. Each article provides a thorough review of previous research on psychiatric disorders among the Black population. These articles were written by the same team, and one exclusively focused on Black women, whereas the other focused on Black men. In each, comparisons were made between African Americans, native-born Black Caribbeans, and foreign-born Black Caribbeans. Jones et al. (2020) found that one in three African American women met criteria for a lifetime psychiatric disorder compared to one in three native-born Caribbean women and one in five foreign-born Caribbean women. Of these three groups, native-born Caribbean women were most likely to seek mental health counseling. The article examining Black men (Mays et al. 2018) found that although their prevalence rates of psychiatric problems were relatively low, their disorders were chronic and untreated. Compared with African American men, native-born Black Caribbean men had higher prevalence rates of post-traumatic stress disorder, major depressive disorder, and alcohol abuse disorder. Seeking help for mental health problems was lowest for foreign-born Black Caribbean men. In addition to providing basic prevalence information for these important mental disorders, these data have been extremely helpful to mental health clinicians; see R. Taylor and Chatters (2020) for a review of this work.

The NSAL was instrumental in publishing several of the first estimates of the national prevalence rates of trauma and PTSD for African Americans and Black Caribbeans. Among both African Americans and Black Caribbeans, 8 out of 10 adults were either the victim of trauma or had a relative or close friend who was the victim of a traumatic event (Gran-Ruaz et al. 2022). Both African American and Black Caribbean women were more likely to be the victims of rape, sexual assault, or being beaten by a spouse, whereas men were more likely to be mugged, to see someone badly injured, or to be exposed to toxins (Gran-Ruaz et al. 2022). Analysis using the combined sample of African Americans and Black Caribbeans revealed that being a refugee, raped, badly beaten by a spouse, badly beaten by parents, stalked, or ever having a life-threatening illness were all positively associated with having PTSD (Gran-Ruaz et al. 2022). Demographic analysis of PTSD revealed that, similar to White Americans, African American women had higher rates of PTSD than did African American men (Himle et al. 2009). However, among Black Caribbeans, men had higher rates of PTSD than did women (Himle et al. 2009).

Research using the NSAL has been instrumental in identifying the risk and protective factors associated with PTSD. This research is important because the majority of people who are the victims of trauma do not develop PTSD. Nguyen, Chatters, and Taylor (2016) found that emotional support from family members is protective of PTSD, while negative interaction with family is a risk factor for 12-month PTSD. Another analysis found that attending religious services at least once a week was protective of both 12-month and lifetime PTSD (Hodge et al. 2022). However, Hodge et al. (2022) also found that the frequency of reading religious materials was positively associated with a greater probability of having lifetime PTSD, as well as 12-month panic disorder, 12-month agoraphobia, and lifetime generalized anxiety disorder. Although these positive associations seem counterintuitive, they are consistent with research in this field indicating that having an anxiety disorder is associated with increases in reading religious materials as part of efforts to cope (Hodge et al. 2022).

Mental health treatment

Research on help-seeking for mental health issues using the NSBA data was primarily conducted by Harold Neighbors (e.g., Neighbors and Jackson 1984). The topic of mental health was an important focus for the NSAL and, as a consequence, there are several studies of treatment and help-seeking using these data. PRBA’s Amanda Woodward published several papers on professional and informal help-seeking (Woodward et al. 2008) and the role of complementary health care for mental health problems (Woodward et al. 2009). PRBA researchers also examined help-seeking from clergy (Chatters et al. 2017). There are also numerous studies of treatment of psychiatric disorders (e.g., Neighbors et al. 2007), but much of this work was conducted by researchers not officially affiliated with PRBA (Green et al. 2020; Jones et al. 2022). See R. Taylor and Chatters (2020) for a review of this work.

Health Sociology

A collection of NSAL papers has addressed several of the leading chronic health problems, including heart disease, cancer, and diabetes. One of the strengths of the NSAL is the ability to examine racial and ethnic differences in reports of overall physical health, as well as specific ailments. For example, Erving (2022) found that among women aged 50 and over, Black Caribbean women had better health than their African American counterparts in terms of self-rated health, multiple chronic conditions, and the number of functional limitations. Other research found important differences in physical health among Black Caribbeans based on their nativity (foreign-born vs. U.S. born) and the number of years of residence in the United States (Griffith et al. 2011; Ifatunji, Faustin, and Wallace 2024).

A further advantage of the NSAL is the ability to examine specific contextual variables to examine both risk and protective factors of physical health status. Research along these lines has examined the health impacts of various social factors such as social isolation (Baker et al. 2022; Hamler et al. 2025), colorism (Monk 2021), discrimination (Mouzon et al. 2017; Oh et al. 2021), stress (Erving 2022); sleep (Archibald, Rhodes, and Thorpe 2025); and psychological resources (Erving, Satcher, and Chen 2021). For example, research findings indicate that racial discrimination (Mouzon, Taylor et al. 2022) as well as social isolation (H. Taylor et al. 2024) are associated with both poorer self-rated physical and oral health. Additionally, criminal justice contact has been associated with lower self-rated physical health and oral health and higher levels of smoking for both men and women (Valera, Taylor, and Chatters 2018). Lastly, as noted earlier, the NSAL includes numerous mental health and psychiatric disorder variables, which have been used to examine the presence of physical and mental health comorbidities (Erving 2018; Oh et al. 2019).

The Sociology of Racism and Discrimination

The NSAL has generated an abundance of rich research on the topic of “unfair treatment,” also known as discrimination, including two widely validated scales of discrimination developed by sociologist David Williams and psychologist James Jackson. The 10-item Expanded Everyday Discrimination Scale (Williams et al. 1997) taps routine daily microaggressions, such as receiving poorer services at restaurants and stores, while the Major Experiences of Discrimination Scale assesses lifetime exposure to more influential events, such as being unfairly denied a promotion (Williams et al. 1997). NSAL research has examined the roles of both day-to-day discrimination and lifetime exposure to discrimination, including studies of correlates of discrimination as well as the impact of discrimination on physical and mental health. Research on the correlates of discrimination has focused on adults (Keith et al. 2017), older adults (Mouzon, Taylor, and Chatters 2020; Sylvers et al. 2022), and Black Caribbeans (R. Taylor, Forsyth-Brown, et al. 2019).

Research on discrimination as an independent variable has examined the association between discrimination and both mental disorders and mental health symptoms, while a smaller body of research focuses on physical health outcomes. Discrimination has typically been linked to greater odds of major depressive disorder (Assari, Lankarani, and Caldwell 2018; Hudson et al. 2016), social anxiety disorder (Levine et al. 2014), substance use disorders (Mattingly et al. 2022), mood and anxiety disorders (Mouzon et al. 2017; Nguyen et al. 2023), symptoms of obsessive-compulsive disorders (Williams et al. 2017), and other DSM disorders (Assari 2018). Other research has studied the association between discrimination and mental health symptoms, such as depressive symptoms (Goodwill, Taylor, and Watkins 2021; Mouzon and Brock 2021; Mouzon et al. 2017), serious psychological distress (Hamler et al. 2022; Mouzon and Brock 2021; Nguyen, Hamler, and Cobb 2018), suicidal thoughts and behaviors (Goodwill, Taylor, and Watkins 2021), and psychotic experiences (Oh et al. 2016).

In research on physical health using NSAL, discrimination has been studied in relation to cardiovascular disease and symptoms (Chae et al. 2012), chronic kidney disease (Nguyen, Hamler, and Cobb 2018), obesity (Thorpe et al. 2017), and other chronic health problems (Oh et al. 2021). NSAL data have also been used to investigate the correlates and typologies of discrimination (Keith et al. 2017; Mouzon et al. 2020; Sylvers et al. 2022; R. Taylor et al. 2019).

Discrimination research using NSAL data provides unique insights regarding the attributions, or the stated reason why an individual reports having been subjected to unfair treatment. Although most NSAL discrimination research on Black people in the United States examines unfair treatment in a global sense (not attributed to any status characteristic), several studies link experiences of unfair treatment to respondents’ attributions regarding race, ancestry, national origins, or skin tone. Although both types of discrimination are harmful for health (e.g., Mouzon et al. 2017), a few studies suggest a stronger influence of racial versus nonracial discrimination on both physical and mental health (Chae, Lincoln, and Jackson 2011; Mouzon et al. 2017; Williams et al. 2017).

Sociology has often been interested in the process that links stressors (such as discrimination) to health outcomes and the various pathways of effects that either reduce the harmful impact of a stressor (buffering) or exacerbate a stressor’s harmful impact. NSAL research has successfully identified multiple protective factors that buffer Black people from the health consequences of discrimination. Specifically, scholars have identified that aspects of religion (Nguyen et al. 2022), coping (Mouzon and Brock 2021), a sense of mastery (Miller, Rote, and Keith 2013), and racial identity (Chae et al. 2010; Mouzon, Brock, et al. 2022) often exert a protective effect, either helping to explain or weakening the association between discrimination and health.

The Sociology of Colorism

Another important body of NSAL research highlights the role of perceived skin tone discrimination. Skin tone discrimination research using NSAL has used both measures of out-group or inter-group skin tone discrimination (by White actors) and in-group or intra-group skin tone discrimination (also known as colorism, performed by Black actors). Some research on inter- and intra-racial skin tone discrimination models it as a predictor associated with mental (Oh and Nicholson 2021) and physical health outcomes (Monk 2021), as well as criminal justice contact (Monk 2019). However, frequency and typologies of both discrimination and skin tone discrimination have also been examined as outcomes, predicted by self-rated and interviewer-rated skin tone (Keith et al. 2017). Like much of the research using the NSAL, the findings on the impact of colorism can be very nuanced. As an example, Diette et al. (2015) found that unemployed Black women with darker complexions are more likely to suffer their first onset of depression than unemployed Black women with lighter skin tones. See Chatters et al. (2023) for a brief review of PRBA’s research on colorism.

The Sociology of Black Politics

Black political behavior is one of the PRBA’s major research areas. Several major scholars of Black politics were trained at PRBA, including R. Khari Brown (Wayne State University), Ronald Brown (Wayne State University), Robert Brown (Spelman College), Todd Shaw (University of South Carolina), Katherine Tate (Brown University), and Michael Dawson (University of Chicago). Although this group of scholars is smaller than PRBA researchers in sociology, psychology, public health, and social work, they are extremely highly regarded in political science and have published influential books in the field of Black politics.

Smith’s (2014) book used NSAL data to investigate political and policy attitudes among African Americans and Black Caribbeans. Sullivan, Winburn, and Cross (2018) provided an extensive investigation of the impact of racial identity on political behavior. There is also extensive work examining the impact of religion on Black political behavior, including R. Khari Brown’s Race and the Power of Sermons on American Politics (Brown, Brown, and James 2021). Other work by Brown includes the impact of religion and the Black Lives Matter movement (Brown, Brown, and Randall 2023), religion and environmental policy (Brown, Eschler, and Ronald 2021), and religion and vaccine acceptance (R. K. Brown, Campbell, et al. 2023).

The Sociology of African American Aging

African American aging research

Gerontology is another major research area of PRBA, with considerable research on older adults and family social support (Nguyen 2017; R. Taylor, Nguyen, and Tsuchiya 2026), church support (Nguyen 2017), religious participation (J. Taylor et al. 2007), discrimination (Mouzon, Taylor, Nguyen, et al. 2020; Sylvers et al. 2022), and psychiatric disorders (Jones et al. 2022; Nguyen et al. 2022). Nguyen’s (2017) research on the social support networks of older adults using NSAL data identifies four distinct support network typologies—optimal, family-centered, strained, and ambivalent—and shows that race interacts with age and education to shape membership across these network typologies. Together, these findings highlight the considerable within-group heterogeneity among Black older adults. The strength of PRBA in the field of gerontology has been acknowledged by other scholars who have stated that PRBA researchers, James Jackson, Letha Chadiha, Linda M. Chatters, and Robert Joseph Taylor (C. Brown et al. 2013), are pioneers in the field of African American Aging. See Chatters et al. (2023) for more information about PRBA mentoring in gerontology and in several other areas.

Michigan Center for Urban African American Aging Research (MCUAAAR)

MCUAAAR is a National Institute on Aging-funded center and a collaboration between the University of Michigan, Wayne State University, and Michigan State University. MCUAAAR has been in operation for more than 25 years and has provided mentoring and pilot grant funding for 95 junior scholars, including several notable sociologists (see Table 1; see Mezuk et al. 2020 for a description of the history and mentoring strategies of MCUAAAR). It is through the MCUAAAR that the PRBA has conducted its summer mentoring programs for junior faculty and doctoral students. MCUAAAR’s summer mentoring programs started in 1998, and several sociologists have been faculty mentors, including Verna Keith, Tod Hamilton, Taylor Hargrove, and Michael Thornton. Additionally, the vast majority of PRBA’s community outreach in Detroit and Flint is under the auspices of MCUAAAR (Perry et al. 2023, 2024; Rorai et al. 2021).

The Sociology of Black Adolescence

As noted earlier, research on African American and Black Caribbean adolescents is an integral part of PRBA. Research using the NSAL Adolescent Supplement (NSAL-A) has addressed numerous critical issues, including discrimination, family and church-based social support, religious participation, colorism, substance use, depression, suicidal behaviors, eating disorders, racial socialization, parental support, sexual initiation, pubertal development, and teacher-based discrimination. Much of the research on the NSAL-A conducted by Cleopatra Caldwell, Eleanor Seaton, Theda Rose, and Shervin Assari has addressed the impact of discrimination on various mental health outcomes (see Chatters et al. 2023). In addition to the principal investigators of the NSAL-A (i.e., Caldwell and Jackson), Shervin Assari and Theda Rose have published the most using the NSAL-A. Two of the more notable studies conducted using the NSAL-A were authored by Bridgett Goosby and colleagues and Theda Rose and colleagues. Goosby et al. (2011) found that among both African Americans and Black Caribbeans, lower levels of stress were associated with better psychological adjustment. Rose, Joe, and Hancock (2024) found that adolescent educational expectations were important for mental health. In particular, they found that lower psychological distress was associated with greater expectations, which were also linked to better grades, lower grade repetition, and fewer expulsions. This article received an honorable mention from the Society for Social Work Research’s 2026 Excellence in Research Award.

Relatively little research has examined religious participation among adolescents in general. Two recent studies specifically have focused on African American adolescents. R. Taylor, Nguyen, and Tsuchiya (2026) found that, like their adult counterparts, African American adolescents reported high levels of religious participation. Consistent with research on adult populations, gender and regional differences indicated that adolescent girls and residents of the South were more engaged in religious activities than boys and youth in other regions. This study also examined whether adolescents felt that their parents or guardians required them to attend religious services. Interestingly, adolescents who felt that their parents compelled religious service attendance reported lower levels of other forms of religious involvement.

A second study (Hodge et al. 2026) examined religious socialization among African American and Black Caribbean adolescents. This study of religious socialization is an important addition to the literature on adolescent socialization. Although there are numerous papers on adolescent racial socialization, only a few studies examine religious socialization. Study findings indicated that mothers, grandmothers, and aunts were heavily involved in socializing African American and Black Caribbean adolescents regarding the importance of religion. The most frequent religious socialization messages for both groups were (1) having faith/believing in God; (2) living by religious and societal principles/doing the right thing; (3) engaging in prayer; and (4) seeking guidance from/trusting in God/religion is important.

Innovation in Methods and Measurement

Innovation in survey methods

Prior to 1979, one of the major reasons that national probability surveys of Black Americans were not conducted was because the training, recruitment, and field costs were prohibitive. For example, screening for eligible Black households in high-density White neighborhoods was especially expensive and time-consuming. In response, PRBA faculty developed two different screening methods (one for high-density Black neighborhoods and another for low-density Black neighborhoods). These screening methods were proven to be more cost-effective and just as accurate as standard screening methods. See Jackson (1991) for a thorough discussion of these methods.

Qualitative and mixed methods

Although the PRBA is known more for its national probability surveys, several qualitative studies have also been conducted. The majority of the qualitative research was focused on developing various aspects of survey research. For instance, as part of the questionnaire development for the NSBA, a back-translation process was used to examine whether respondents and PRBA researchers have the same understanding of concepts or proposed question wording. One of the larger qualitative studies focused on religious participation, coping, and social support. This study convened separate focus groups of African American men, women, and ministers to provide a more nuanced understanding of the various survey research findings in these areas. Study findings are presented in R. Taylor, Chatters, and Levin (2004).

Multidimensional measure of religious participation

PRBA researchers developed and validated a three-dimensional model of religious participation, consisting of organizational, non-organizational, and subjective religiosity (R. Taylor, Chatters, and Levin 2004). Organizational religious participation refers to behaviors that occur within the context of a church, mosque, or other religious setting (e.g., church attendance, participation in auxiliary groups). Nonorganizational religious participation refers to behaviors that may occur outside of a religious setting (e.g., private prayer, reading religious materials, watching or listening to religious television and radio programs). Subjective religiosity refers to perceptions and attitudes regarding religion, such as perceived importance of religion, and individual perceptions of being religious. This multidimensional measure has been used in analysis using both the NSAL (R. Taylor, Chatters, and Abelson 2012) and NSBA (R. Taylor, Chatters, and Levin 2004) datasets. See R. Taylor, Chatters, and Levin (2004) for a more detailed discussion of this issue.

Everyday and major discrimination

PRBA researchers David Williams and James Jackson developed both the everyday and major discrimination scales. These scales have by far been the most influential scales developed by PRBA researchers. There are more than 1,000 published papers utilizing these scales, including national and international research among various study populations. These populations differ by age, health (cancer), and racial/ethnic background. See Chatters et al. (2023) and Williams and Griffith (2019) for information on how these scales were developed.

NSAL: BIBLIOMETRIC ANALYSIS

For this article, we created a dataset that began with a bibliography of 595 publications from 2004 to 2024, which was maintained by the PRBA; this data set does not contain publications that are based on the NSAL adolescent data. We enriched the database using three different techniques. First, we used the CrossRef application programming interface (API; Perron et al. 2025) to obtain additional metadata, including citation counts and article DOIs. This process successfully obtained data on 93.3 percent of the overall collection of papers. Second, based on our own experience with the NSAL data, we constructed 11 different topics. Using the DOIs, we obtained article abstracts from Web of Science, which we used to assign each article to one of these topics. This was done using a small language model (gpt-oss:20b) from OpenAI (OpenAI 2025; see also Qi et al. 2025). Finally, we normalized all author names, resolving multiple variations of a name into a single entity; this step is necessary for network analysis of bibliometric data.

Citation Analysis

The analysis of the 595 publications revealed that they were collectively cited more than 25,000 times, with a mean of 42.1 citations per paper. (Please note that the citation data were assessed on December 7, 2025). This figure represents a floor estimate of citations, as CrossRef does not index every journal, and our matching process captured only 93.3 percent of the collection. Table 2 presents the 25 most cited papers based on the NSAL. The most cited paper (McLean et al. 2011) investigated gender differences in anxiety disorder prevalence, course, and burden using the NSAL and other CPES data sets. The second most cited study (Williams et al. 2007) established prevalence rates of major depressive disorder for African Americans and Black Caribbeans. The third and fourth most cited papers provide sampling and methodological descriptions of the NSAL and other CPES datasets.

Table 2.

Top 25 Most-Cited Papers Using the NSAL (2004–2024)^*

Rank	Citations	Reference
1	1,853	McLean et al. (2011). Gender differences in anxiety disorders: Prevalence, course of illness, comorbidity and burden of illness. Journal of Psychiatric Research, 45(8), 1027–1035.
2	967	Williams et al. (2007). Prevalence and distribution of major depressive disorder in African Americans, Caribbean blacks and non-Hispanic whites: Results from the National Survey of American Life. Archives of General Psychiatry, 64(3), 305–315.
3	627	Jackson et al. (2004). The National Survey of American Life: A study of racial, ethnic and cultural influences on mental disorders and mental health. The International Journal of Methods in Psychiatric Research, 13(4), 196–207.
4	542	Heeringa, S. G., Wagner, J., Torres, M., Duan, N., Adams, T., & Berglund, P. (2004). Sample designs and sampling methods for the Collaborative Psychiatric Epidemiology Studies (CPES). The International Journal of Methods in Psychiatric Research, 13(4), 221–240.
5	513	Alegría, M., Chatterji, P., Wells, K., Cao, Z., Chen, C., Takeuchi, D., Jackson, J., & Meng, X. (2008). Disparity in depression treatment among racial and ethnic minority populations in the United States. Psychiatric Services, 59(11), 1264–1272.
6	391	Taylor, H. O., Taylor, R. J., Nguyen, A. W., & Chatters, L. (2018). Social isolation, depression, and psychological distress among older adults. Journal of Aging and Health, 30(2), 229–246.
7	376	Marques, L., Alegría, M., Becker, A. E., Chen, C-N., Fang, A., Chosak, A., & Diniz, J. B. (2011). Comparative prevalence, correlates of impairment, and service utilization for eating disorders across US ethnic groups: Implications for reducing ethnic disparities in health care access for eating disorders. International Journal of Eating Disorders, 44(5), 412–420.
8	328	González, H. M., Vega, W. A., Williams, D. R., Tarraf, W., West, B. T., & Neighbors, H. W. (2010). Depression care in the United States: Too little for too few. Archives of General Psychiatry, 67(1), 37–46.
9	289	González, H. M., Tarraf, W., Whitfield, K. E., & Vega, W. A. (2010). The epidemiology of major depression and ethnicity in the United States. Journal of Psychiatric Research, 44(15), 1043–1051.
10	264	Monk, E. P. (2015). The cost of color: Skin color, discrimination, and health among African-Americans. American Journal of Sociology, 121(2), 396–444.
11	252	Asnaani, A., Richey, J. A., Dimaite, R., Hinton, D. E., & Hofmann, S. G. (2012). A cross-ethnic comparison of lifetime prevalence rates of anxiety disorders. Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, 198(8), 551–555.
12	252	Hudson, D. L., Neighbors, H. W., Geronimus, A. T., & Jackson, J. S. (2016). Racial discrimination, John Henryism, and depression among African Americans. Journal of Black Psychology, 42(3), 221–243.
13	250	Williams, D. R., Haile, R., González, H. M., Neighbors, H. W., Baser, R. E., & Jackson, J. S. (2007). The mental health of black Caribbean immigrants: Results from the National Survey of American Life. American Journal of Public Health, 97(1), 52–59.
14	241	Taylor, R. J., Chatters, L. M., Woodward, A. T., & Brown, E. (2013). Racial and ethnic differences in extended family, friendship, fictive kin, and congregational informal support networks. Family Relations, 62(4), 609–624.
15	224	Pennell, B-E., Bowers, A., Carr, D., Chardoul, S., Cheung, G-Q., Dinkelmann, K., Gebler, N., Hansen, S.E., Pennell, S., & Torres, M. (2004). The development and implementation of the National Comorbidity Survey Replication, the National Survey of American Life, and the National Latino and Asian American Survey. The International Journal of Methods in Psychiatric Research, 13(4), 241–269.
16	224	Neighbors, H. W., Caldwell, C. H., Williams, D. R., Nesse, R. N., Taylor, R. J., Bullard, K. M., Torres, M., & Jackson, J. S. (2007). Race, ethnicity, and the use of services for mental disorders: Results from the National Survey of American Life. Archives of General Psychiatry, 64(4), 485–494.
17	218	Himle, J. A., Baser, R. E., Taylor, R. J., Campbell, R. D., & Jackson, J. S. (2009). Anxiety disorders among African Americans, blacks of Caribbean descent and non-Hispanic whites in the United States. Journal of Anxiety Disorders, 23(5), 578–590.
18	198	Chatters, L. M., Taylor, R. J., Jackson, J. S., & Lincoln, K. D. (2008). Religious coping among African Americans, Caribbean blacks and non-Hispanic whites. Journal of Community Psychology, 36(3), 371–386.
19	193	Nguyen, A. W., Chatters, L. M., Taylor, R. J., & Mouzon, D. M. (2016). Social support from family and friends and subjective well-being of older African Americans. Journal of Happiness Studies, 17(3), 959–979.
20	192	Chatters, L. M., Taylor, R. J., Bullard, K. M., & Jackson, J. S. (2009). Race and ethnic differences in religious involvement: African Americans, Caribbean blacks and non-Hispanic whites. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 32(7), 1143–1163.
21	187	Chou, T., Asnaani, A., & Hofmann, S. G. (2012). Perception of racial discrimination and psychopathology across three U.S. ethnic minority groups. Cultural Diversity and Ethnic Minority Psychology, 18(1), 74–81.
22	183	Joe, S., Baser, R. E., Breeden, G., Neighbors, H. W., & Jackson, J. S. (2006). Prevalence of and risk factors for lifetime suicide attempts among blacks in the United States. Journal of the American Medical Association, 296(17), 2112–2123.
23	174	Monk Jr., E. P. (2014). Skin tone stratification among black Americans, 2001–2003. Social Forces, 92(4), 1313–1337.
24	171	Alegría, M., Fortuna, L. R., Lin, J. Y., Norris, F. H., Gao, S., Takeuchi, D. T., Jackson, J. S., Shrout, P. E., & Valentine, A. (2013). Prevalence, risk, and correlates of posttraumatic stress disorder across ethnic and racial minority groups in the United States. Medical Care, 51(12), 1114–1123.
25	169	DeVylder, J. E., Lukens, E. P., Link, B. G., & Lieberman, J. A. (2015). Suicidal ideation and suicide attempts among adults with psychotic experiences: Data from the Collaborative Psychiatric Epidemiology Surveys. JAMA Psychiatry, 72(3), 219–225.

^*Citations were collected on December 7, 2025, using CrossRef.

Journal Analysis

Consistent with the breadth and depth of the NSAL questionnaire, research based on the NSAL has been published in 208 journals, demonstrating a broad disciplinary reach. At the same time, NSAL research has established a strong presence in key outlets: Thirty-six journals have published five or more NSAL papers, and the top 15 journals alone account for 31 percent of publications and 37 percent of citations. Figure 1 presents these 15 journals ranked by publication volume. A review of the thematic orientations of these leading outlets reveals sustained scholarly engagement in four domains: health disparities research, psychiatric epidemiology, gerontology, and public health.

Figure 1.

Top 15 journals ranked by volume of NSAL articles (2002–2024).

Authorship and Co-Authorship Network Analysis

Table 3 lists the 20 authors who have published the most NSAL papers. As noted in the table, the majority of prolific NSAL authors were associated with the PRBA in some way. The most prolific PRBA first authors are R. Taylor, Assari, Nguyen, Lincoln, and Erving, and the most prolific authors external to PRBA are Oh, DeVylder, and Kim.

Table 3.

Author Ranking by Number of NSAL Publications (2004–2024)

Rank	Author	Publications	PRBA-affiliated author
1	Taylor, Robert Joseph	109	Yes
2	Chatters, Linda M.	89	Yes
3	Jackson, James S.	73	Yes
4	Nguyen, Ann W.	37	Yes
5	Lincoln, Karen D.	34	Yes
6	Assari, Shervin	33	Yes
7	Neighbors, Harold W.	31	Yes
8	Mouzon, Dawne M.	23	Yes
9	Oh, Hans Y.	22	No
10	Woodward, Amanda Toler	22	Yes
11	Williams, David R.	19	Yes
12	Alegría, Margarita	17	No
13	Erving, Christy L.	16	Yes
14	Taylor, Harry Owen	16	Yes
15	Himle, Joseph A.	14	Yes
16	DeVylder, Jordan E.	14	No
17	Koyanagi, Ai	14	No
18	Chae, David H.	13	Yes
19	Matusko, Niki N.	13	Yes
20	Watkins, Daphne C.	13	Yes

Of the 595 papers in this database, there were 762 different authors and 2,168 unique collaborative relationships. Forty-seven authors had published five or more articles. Overall, James Jackson had 120 different coauthors and collaborated with 15.7 percent of all authors. Robert Joseph Taylor had 86 coauthors, and Harold W. Neighbors had 62 coauthors. Analysis of the annual count of authors publishing their first NSAL-related paper, 2004–2022, revealed a sustained influx of 40 to 65 new authors annually from 2010 to 2021, demonstrating continued engagement of new researchers with NSAL data.

An examination of the research topics revealed that PRBA researchers established the foundation during the early period on the NSAL (2004–2012), publishing 59 percent of papers, including essential methodology and foundational studies. As the data set matured, external researchers increasingly used NSAL data, accounting for 59 percent of more recent publications (2013–2022). In addition, PRBA-affiliated researchers were more likely to publish papers on religion and spirituality, family and social relationships, and depression. Researchers external to PRBA were more likely to publish in the areas of discrimination and racial stress, physical health and comorbidity, and addiction and substance use.

Figure 2 shows the network structure of co-authorship of prolific NSAL researchers. Because of the large number of coauthors using the NSAL, this analysis was restricted to prolific NSAL researchers (>5 publications). The network includes 45 authors connected by 201 co-authorship relationships. Labeled nodes indicate the 10 most productive researchers by publication count. Node size is proportional to publication volume; edge thickness reflects the number of coauthored papers between author pairs.

Figure 2.

Co-authorship network of prolific NSAL researchers (five or more journal articles). The network includes 45 authors connected by 201 co-authorship relationships. Labeled nodes indicate the 10 most productive researchers by publication count.

The network exhibits a core-periphery structure characteristic of established research programs:

• —**Central cluster**: The dense core comprises researchers affiliated with the PRBA, including Taylor, Chatters, Jackson, and Neighbors, who have collaborated extensively across multiple publications.

• —**Peripheral clusters**: Smaller clusters on the network edges represent independent research groups that have utilized NSAL data but collaborated less frequently with the PRBA core.

• —**Bridge authors**: Researchers such as Lincoln and Woodward occupy positions connecting different clusters, facilitating knowledge transfer across research groups.

The network structure reflects NSAL’s development as a shared research resource. The PRBA core team, responsible for NSAL’s design and implementation, remains central to the collaboration network two decades after data collection. The presence of peripheral clusters demonstrates successful dissemination of NSAL data to independent research groups, while bridge authors indicate integration between the founding team and newer researchers.

The NSAL continues to generate impactful scholarship more than two decades after data collection—a testament to its enduring scientific value and the ongoing importance of understanding mental health among Black Americans.

NATIONAL SURVEY OF AMERICAN LIFE 2.0

A new wave of the NSAL, which we refer to as NSAL 2.0, was recently funded by the National Institute on Aging (NIA). The focus of the new study is to examine various risk and protective factors of Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias (ADRD) among respondents who previously participated in the NSAL and the NSAL adolescent study. In particular, this study will reinterview surviving NSAL participants to collect longitudinal data on a range of risk factors and culturally relevant psychosocial resources for cognitive and physical functioning. Physical functioning will be measured by several survey and clinical measures, including blood pressure, grip strength, hearing, balance, as well as a blood draw. Respondents will also be given a cognitive assessment. The emphasis on cognition is important because African Americans are more likely to develop cognitive impairment, and dementia is a leading cause of disability and mortality. The proposed sample size for this study will be 2,600, and the data collection will begin in 2026.

CONCLUSION

The PRBA has made significant contributions to African American research and to Black sociology. Over its 50-year period, the faculty and alumni of the PRBA have produced an impactful body of scholarship that fulfills Wright and Thomas’s (2006) principles of Black sociology. The PRBA has mentored numerous scholars who are now named professors, department chairs, deans, and a provost at major universities (Chatters et al. 2023). In turn, this group of PRBA-trained academicians has gone on to mentor and publish with numerous students and emerging scholars. Some notable mentors include Linda Chatters, Jacquie Mattis, Harold Neighbors, Robert Sellers, and Robert Joseph Taylor, who have, through various research labs, mentoring groups, and summer programs, mentored numerous scholars. For example, Williams et al. (2023:441) argue that the mentorship and contributions to the professional development of scholars by former PRBA graduate student Robert Sellers have resulted in new intergenerational knowledge building. As such, the cumulative contributions and reach of the PRBA is immense and more extensive than what is indicated in the list of sociologists (Table 1) or the list of PRBA scholars provided in Chatters et al. (2023).

Most importantly, PRBA’s research has made significant and lasting contributions to understanding the range and complexity of Black American life. These contributions have been achieved through the production and publication of research, as well as the development and mentoring of numerous students, postdoctoral scholars, and faculty who continue to make major contributions to the literature. One indicator of the overall contribution of the PRBA is the receipt of the 2025 Inclusive Voices Award from the American Association of Public Opinion Research. (More in-depth information about the PRBA can be found in the review papers that were noted throughout this article and the PRBA YouTube Channel, which houses several oral histories of PRBA founders: https://www.youtube.com/@programforresearchonblacka5019).

Although the PRBA has been successful, it is important that we do not lose sight of the work that lies ahead. Although we have made headway in our understanding of a large variety of issues that are critical to Black and other communities, it is fair to say that additional and updated research is needed. This should involve population-based data with valid and reliable measures, as well as instruments tailored to the cultural dynamics of the Black population. Only then can we devise appropriate culturally informed approaches for preventive and intervention measures and programs that support the needs of Black individuals and communities.

Biographies

Robert Joseph Taylor, PhD, MSW, is the Harold Johnson Endowed Professor of Social Work and director of the Program for Research on Black Americans at the Institute for Social Research at the University of Michigan. His research addresses the informal social support networks of African Americans. He has been a principal or co-principal investigator of several grants from the National Institute on Aging, examining the role of religion in the lives of Black and White elderly adults, and from the National Institute of Mental Health, examining mental health and illness among Black Americans, including the National Survey of American Life.

Krim K. Lacey is an associate professor in the Department of Sociology and African and African American Studies at the University of Michigan-Dearborn. His primary research is on intimate partner violence, focusing on minority and immigrant populations. He has also been engaged in research that addresses the influence of social context and cultural factors on the physical and mental well-being of Caribbeans residing in the United States, Canada, and England, and within the Caribbean region. Krim earned his doctorate from Wayne State University. He also received post-doctoral training from both the University of Michigan’s Institute for Social Research at the Program for Research on Black Americans (PRBA) and Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

Dawne Marie Mouzon, PhD, seeks to identify and explain risk and protective factors for the physical and mental health of populations of African descent. Her early work focused on testing presumed protective factors to explain “the Black-White mental health paradox,” or the unexpected finding that Black Americans generally exhibit better mental health outcomes than Whites despite their lower socioeconomic standing and greater exposure to discrimination. Her current research program focuses on identifying adaptive coping resources and strategies African Americans use in the face of chronic stress and racial discrimination, with a focus on gender differences in these processes.

Analidis Ochoa, MSW, is a doctoral candidate in social work and sociology at the University of Michigan. Her research addresses how paid plasma donation has become an increasingly common economic coping strategy among low-middle income people in the United States.

Brian Perron, PhD, MSW, is a professor at the University of Michigan School of Social Work and co-director of the Child and Adolescent Data Lab. His research integrates artificial intelligence and data science methods with social work scholarship, focusing on the application of large language models, natural language processing, and machine learning to enhance research and practice in child welfare, substance use, and mental health services.