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How people think and feel about their neighborhood impacts the way they think of themselves and their futures. These linkages are especially important to understand in the case of urban‐residing young Black women. Researchers know very little about what contributes to young Black adults' urban neighborhood perceptions and often rely on "expert" definitions of markers of neighborhood quality. These definitions and subsequent explorations of residents' neighborhood assessment have not adequately considered intersecting oppressive systems that structure urban spaces both physically and socially. Further, within‐group diversity of young Black adults based on other social identities, such as gender and class, has gone underexplored in research on residents' neighborhood assessment. We used theory from Black feminist geography and sociology to guide our thematic analysis of interviews with young Black women (N = 9) regarding their urban neighborhood quality. We sought to explore the aspects or features of the neighborhood that young Black women discussed and how social identities may play a role in young Black women's descriptions of their urban neighborhoods. We argue three themes tell an overarching story of young Black women's urban spatial critical analysis: (1) outsiders' perceptions versus our realities, (2) gendered safety, and (3) visibility of young Black women. Young Black women's narratives highlighted communal aspects of neighborhood evaluation and attention to dominant narratives regarding marginalized groups and urban spaces. Highlights: Young Black women may have unique perspectives and experiences of urban space due to social identity.We locate young Black women's discussion of urban space within intersecting oppressive histories.We present themes about social identity, outsider perspectives, and visibility.Participants critiqued social institutions and illustrated resistance to hegemonic perspectives.Urban neighborhood research should attend to gender, social histories, and residents' experiences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: Research on prosocial behavior among Black1 Americans should account for the daily realities that many face, including racial discrimination and cultural resources which may provide sources of resilience amidst injustice, such as religiosity and spirituality. We assessed whether racial discrimination, religiosity, and existential well-being (EWB) are related to the odds of engaging in prosocial behaviors for Black men. Method: Using data from a community-dwelling sample of 171 Black men in the United States, we used logistic regression tests to assess whether racial discrimination, organizational religiosity, personal religiosity, and EWB were associated with Black men's volunteering, mentoring, and charitable giving. We also examined whether racial discrimination moderated the association between religiosity and prosocial behavior. Results: Discrimination was not significantly associated with Black men's odds of engaging in prosocial actions. Odds of volunteering were significantly greater among Black men who reported more regular involvement at their religious institutions. Personal religiosity was also significantly associated with greater odds of mentoring youth and charitable giving. Discrimination did not significantly moderate any associations. Conclusions: Black men's faith is a relevant contributor to their prosocial action. Religious institutions and psychologists can work collaboratively in supporting this positive trajectory. Public Significance Statement: Actions oriented toward helping others (prosocial behavior) are healthy for individuals who are prosocial and for society as a whole; yet, Black men are rarely considered in research on this topic. Further, Black men make decisions to be prosocial despite the antisocial racial adversity they face commonly. This study tested whether racial discrimination, religious involvement in places of worship, personal acts of religiosity and spirituality (e.g., praying), and a sense of purpose in life is related to Black men's volunteering, mentoring, and charitable giving. Black men who were more involved in their places of worship and who practiced more personal faith-based behaviors volunteered, gave to charities, and mentored youth more often than those who were not. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The ways in which Black emerging adults perceive and evaluate their neighborhoods may be impacted by a host of social and political factors that interplay with their social identities, the social identities of other urban residents, and their time in the area. Early literature on Black emerging adults' perceived neighborhood quality (PNQ) tended to make comparisons to White people and to focus disproportionately on the perceptions of low‐income Black people residing in predominately racial/ethnic minority and underresourced communities. Subsequent work on subjective neighborhood assessment has considered specific features of neighborhoods, such as safety or disorder, but a general sense of the quality of one's neighborhood features is still underexplored. The current study adapts Connerly and Marans' (1985) PNQ model to explore the relations between social identities and locations, neighborhood sociostructural features, time in the area, and PNQ among Black urban‐residing emerging adults. Block‐wise regression results suggest that education and partner status were associated with PNQ. Perceptions of the percentage of Black neighbors and Census Bureau proportions of residents in the zip code who are poor were also associated with PNQ. Length of residence in the neighborhood was marginally associated with PNQ while length of residence in the city/town was not significantly associated with PNQ. For young Black women, combined household income was marginally associated with PNQ, but neighborhood sociostructural features were the strongest contributors to PNQ. In contrast, education was the only significant contributor to PNQ for young Black men. We discuss the ways that the social positions of young Black residents and their neighbors may impact their experiences and evaluations of urban areas. Key points: Young Black urban‐residing adults impact and are impacted by neighborhood quality.We contextualize young Black adults' perceived neighborhood quality using demographic factors.The social identities of participants and of neighbors were related to perceived neighborhood quality.Our model was significant for Black women's perceived neighborhood quality, not Black men's.Social histories and contexts are key to young Black adults' perceived neighborhood quality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]