Ethnic Identity Scale (EIS)

The Ethnic Identity Scale was originally designed to assess three distinct components of ethnic-racial identity: (a) exploration, or the degree to which individuals have explored their ethnicity; (b) resolution, or the degree to which they have resolved what their ethnic identity means to them; and (c) affirmation, or the affect (positive or negative) that they associate with their ethnic-group membership (Umaña-Taylor, Yazedjian, & Bámaca-Gómez, 2004). Exploration and resolution capture aspects of the developmental process of ethnic-racial identity, and affirmation captures ethnic-racial identity content. Examination of exploration and resolution as individual scales enables scholars to categorize individuals into ethnic-racial identity statuses of diffuse, foreclosed, moratorium, and achieved (for detailed instructions of this approach see Umaña-Taylor, Yazedjian, & Bámaca-Gómez, 2004). 

Modifications to the Original EIS 

In 2024, the affirmation subscale was reconceptualized as negative ethnoracial affect to reflect recent advances in the field (see Umaña-Taylor, 2024 for a detailed discussion). In addition, recognizing that individuals’ psychological meaning-making regarding their ethnic and racial identities is difficult to disentangle into a specific “ethnic identity” or “racial identity” (see Umaña-Taylor et. al, 2014 for a detailed discussion), recent implementations of the EIS have revised each individual item to refer to "ethnic-racial" identity rather than "ethnicity" or "ethnic identity."  

The versions of the scales provided below reflect these revisions to the original EIS (Umaña-Taylor, Yazedjian, & Bámaca-Gómez, 2004) and the original EIS-Brief (Douglass & Umaña-Taylor, 2015). 

Ethnic-Racial Groups Assessed

The EIS and EIS-B have been used to examine ethnic identity among African American, Asian American, Native American/American Indian, Latino, White, and Multiracial adolescents and adults in the U.S. The EIS has also been used in studies internationally, in Chile, Netherlands, Norway, Germany, Italy, Colombia and Greece. The original scale has been translated into Spanish, German, Greek. 

References

Douglass, S., & Umaña-Taylor, A. J. (2015). A brief form of the Ethnic Identity Scale: Development and empirical validation. Identity, 15(1), 48-65.  

Umaña-Taylor, A. J. (2024). Revisiting the conceptualization and measurement of ethnic-racial identity affect: Recommendations for future directions. Child Development Perspectives, 18, 215–220.

Umaña-Taylor, A.J., Quintana, S.M., Lee, R.M., Cross, W.E., Jr., Rivas-Drake, D., Schwartz, S.J., Syed, M., Yip, T., Seaton, E. and (2014), Ethnic and Racial Identity During Adolescence and Into Young Adulthood: An Integrated Conceptualization. Child Dev, 85: 21-39.

Umaña-Taylor, A. J., Yazedjian, A. & Bámaca-Gómez, M. Y. (2004). Developing the Ethnic Identity Scale using Eriksonian and social identity perspectives. Identity: An International Journal of Theory and Research, 4, 9-38. 

Using EIS

All researchers have permission to use the EIS, with the following citation: Umaña-Taylor, A. J., Yazedjian, A. & Bámaca-Gómez, M. Y. (2004). Developing the Ethnic Identity Scale using Eriksonian and social identity perspectives. Identity: An International Journal of Theory and Research, 4, 9-38.

All researchers have permission to use the EIS-B, with the following citation: Douglass, S., & Umaña-Taylor, A. J. (2015). A brief form of the Ethnic Identity Scale: Development and empirical validation. Identity, 15(1), 48-65. 

If you are planning to translate the EIS or EIS-B into other languages, please send the final version of the measure and any information on how the measure held up in analyses to Adriana Umaña-Taylor.