Acculturation latent profiles as moderators of the relations between racial and gender barriers and outcome expectations among Latinx engineering undergraduates.

OBJECTIVE: Latinx engineering undergraduate students often face racial and gender barriers that shape their career expectations. Guided by Berry's acculturation framework, this study tested whether latent cultural orientation profiles moderate these relationships. METHOD: = 1.7). Latent profile analysis identified four profiles: bicultural, moderately bicultural, assimilated, and separated. A latent mixture regression model tested whether profiles moderated prospective associations between Time 1 barriers and Time 2 engineering outcome expectations, controlling for baseline expectations and gender. RESULTS: = .048), indicating vulnerability to racial barriers. CONCLUSIONS: Findings highlight the importance of considering cultural orientation profiles when examining how barriers influence Latinx students' career development. Whereas gender barriers may serve as a motivational challenge for assimilated students, racial barriers may undermine expectations for separated students. Psychologists and education professionals should tailor interventions to account for these cultural differences to better support Latinx engineering students' persistence and advancement in the field. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).