Jayanthi Mistry, Ph.D. is an Associate Professor in the Eliot-Pearson Department of Child Development at Tufts University. Jayanthi had most of her school and college education in India, and received her M.S. degree in Child Development from M.S. University, Baroda, India. She received her Ph.D. in Child Development from Purdue University, Indiana in 1983, and then completed an NIMH funded postdoctoral fellowship in the Department of Psychology at the University of Utah. She worked for five years at the Kamehameha School in Honolulu, Hawaii before she joined Tufts University. Her research and scholarship is based on cultural perspectives on children’s development and the use of interpretive methods, with a focus on how children from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds navigate multiple cultural worlds and identities. Her husband, Jamshed Mistry (a faculty member in the School of Management at Suffolk University) and she have two daughters – Ashti and Anushay. Ashti is currently completing her undergraduate program at Tufts University and Anushay is a junior at Belmont High School.

Dr. Mistry share some insights on raising children in a multicultural setting.

What major psychological and other challenges do you see for children growing up in South Asian families in the US? On the flip side, do immigrant children also have any special advantages?

I started my research on children of immigrants because I wanted to learn about the special skills they acquire as well as the challenges they face. I began by focusing on potential strengths, reasoning that since they have to learn to live in multiple cultural worlds they must develop expertise in navigating behavioral norms, language, and discourse styles, which is valuable in the current context of globalization. I refer to this as expertise in navigating across cultures. We (my colleagues and students) have been gathering data in the form of retrospective narratives from adolescents and youth about their experiences growing up in multiple cultural worlds. In these stories, youngsters talk about becoming open-minded, learning to be flexible, being sensitive to context, code-switching mannerisms as well as discourse styles, and developing unique ways of blending their dual or multiple cultural heritages (e.g. fusion of music styles, generating hybrid forms of dress, music, food etc.). Of course, they also talk about the intense desire to fit into the larger worlds of school and peer groups, the self-consciousness and even embarrassment that sometimes goes along with not fitting in, as well as the frustration over conflicting norms in their multiple worlds.

Shishu Bharathi , Indian dance classes etc seem to take an investment of time on part of parents and children.  Is the investment of time worth it?

I think these activities are worth the investment of time, as long as they are not unduly forced upon the children. I believe these activities promote a connection with cultural heritage and support the development of child's ethnic identity and sense of belonging to their heritage. It is, I think also clear, that children can have a sense of belonging to multiple cultural worlds – so promoting a connection to cultural heritage does not come at the cost of feeling connected to the larger society and peer group and school settings.

South Asians seem to put a lot of pressure on their children to succeed.  How can a parent know how much is too much or how much is too little?

I do believe that the pressure to achieve can be overdone.  However, in deciding how much is too much or too little, it is most critical for parents to understand and know their children. Pressure and expectations to achieve are most effective when they are in what has been termed the “zone of proximal development” by Vygotsky (a socio-cultural theorist). In other words, expectations should be just a bit more than where the child is at any point – expectations should not be too far ahead and out of reach. This of course means that we, as parents, have to recognize and understand all aspects of our child's development – i.e. their academic strengths, their psychological strengths, their interests and passions and so on. Only then can we set realistic expectations.

Any advice for the "guilty" parent who feels that by not bringing up their child in India they are creating an ABCD - or an American Born Confused Desi?

I am not really convinced of the truth of this representation of our children. I do not think that raising our children to be bi-cultural and able to navigate “cultural worlds” necessarily results in a “confused” person. Rather, I believe it is a strength that will soon be required of all people in a rapidly shrinking global context. Further, from what I have read, as well as the data we have gathered from youth about the strategies they use to navigate multiple worlds, I am intrigued by the various means they use to fuse, blend or cross-integrate across their worlds, or to negotiate the boundaries between their worlds. This does not mean there are no confusions, challenges, and failures to integrate or navigate. But then, isn’t that the challenge of life – to deal with the challenges of circumstances and build skills and strengths from these?

If people chose to return to India what issues should they most aware of in preparing for  the transition for their children? Is there a good age for children to move back to India and on the other side or is there an age that is not appropriate?

These are tough questions for me – mainly because I have never been able to come up with “best practice” type of solutions for anything. I believe that the best solutions are ones in which there is a “goodness of fit” for the individual or families concerned. By this I mean that for some families, when the children are prepared for the transition, and the circumstances of life (such as type of education or schools they will encounter, standard of living etc.) are not going to be too discrepant from what they have experienced here – the transition may work perfectly, and the timing may not matter too much. In other cases, if there are going to be major differences in family life style, education, and peer groups, then timing of the transition might make a difference – it might be easier at earlier ages when home and family (as opposed to peer group or school culture) are still of central focus in children’s lives.

 Adoption is getting quite common amongst South Asians. Are there special dos and dont's that  you would provide for these parents?

I think it is important to be prepared for both the joys and the challenges that they will inevitably face. Also, it is important to maintain a balance between being open about the adoption, while being careful not to over do this. The more the process is “normalized” i.e. treated as a normal or typical part of forming a family, the easier it is for all concerned. I also believe that it is important to recognize that children will go through a challenging time during middle school and early adolescent ages when identity issues (and therefore their biological origins) become salient for them.

What motivated you to chose a career as a faculty member?
I have always enjoyed being a learner and what better way to remain a “learner” all your life?!

What advice do you have for students who may think of a career to becoming a faculty member?

I’m not sure this advice is specific to a career in academics – but I believe that all students should explore and recognize their interest and passion first and foremost, and then figure out the career that can be built on this. I may be an optimist, but I do believe this is possible in today’s world – with the range of choices available to us.

Thanks so much for your time.

Thank you

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