The Effects of Acculturation on the Mexican-American Dementia Caregiver Experience

There is a paucity of research to understand the experience of the Mexican-American caregiver of family members with dementia. The proposed study will investigate how acculturation affects the caregiver experience in the Mexican-American culture. Correlations between caregiver burden, problem behaviors, and positive aspects of caregiving will be computed and compared between participants at two acculturation levels. More caregiver burden and more positive aspects of caregiving are hypothesized to exist in the group with low acculturation, although the correlations between these two variables are expected to be similar in the acculturation groups. These results would imply that acculturation affects Mexican-American caregivers in both positive and negative ways.