The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore the transitions that second year African American college students make as they move from home to a university context where they are underrepresented. It also focused on how ethnic-racial socialization processes and biculturalism served as buffers in the university context. The proposed study had two main goals. The first goal was to examine their perspectives as late adolescents on cultural differences between their home and university experiences, focusing on whether these differences promote bicultural adaptive identities when transitioning between these contexts. The second goal was to explore how African Americans in late adolescence may understand messages about race in the home context and how these messages may affect transitions to college. In-depth individual interviews were conducted and used as the primary method of data collection for this study. In addition, a focus group session provided member checking opportunity and served to strengthen the trustworthiness of the study. The focus group was also used as a secondary data source to corroborate the key findings from the individual interviews.The Phenomenological Variant of Ecological Systems Theory and the Multiple Worlds Typology were utilized as theoretical foundations for this research. For studies involving African American youth, it is essential to utilize cultural ecological perspectives to account for cultural variances. By integrating aspects of both theories, cultural features in protective factors that may serve as buffers for African American youth in these home-university transitions could be explored.Results revealed a number of challenges posed by cultural differences and protective factors for African American college students when transitioning to an institution where students of color were underrepresented. The risk factors that African American students were exposed to in the university context were highlighted, along with the coping strategies used to combat risk factors and promote successful transitions from the home to the university. The implications addressed factors that influence university policy through programmatic implementations. Results have implications for faculty, staff, and universities to create culturally inclusive educational environments for African American college students.
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