CWAA engages in research activities investigating common and/or recurring challenges that are affecting the progress and quality of life of African immigrants and refugees in the United States. The research efforts focus on medical, psychological and social aspects of African immigrants' and refugees' lives. One goal is to find practical and long lasting means of ensuring their successful assimilation and adaptation into mainstream American social and professional culture. Other goals include strengthening family unit and improving health and overall quality of life.

To advance the field of social and behavioral science research by increasing the body of knowledge on African immigrants and refugees in America, thereby facilitating the timely identification of pressing needs and optimizing targeted intervention strategies.

CWAA was founded after many conversations about challenges and distress African parents face raising their children in America. Often parents express concerns that there is scarcity of information on specific parenting challenges they encounter in relation to cultural conflicts, and subsequently ways to go about resolving these challenges.

Fear of family disintegration is strong. Many concerns revolve around an inter-generational gap that is exacerbated by varied rates of assimilation and adaptation between parents and their children. Children seem to readily assimilate to mainstream American culture while parents resist this rapid assimilation for fear of losing their identity. Assimilation and adaptation behaviors seem to be important factors that determine how parents raise their children or successfully adjust and integrate into American society. The shift in power when parents depend on their children to serve as 'interpreters and guides', disrupts the expectations in parent-child authority, contributing significantly to the inter-generational conflict.

On issues of mental health, anecdotal evidence suggest underreported incidents of mental health issues in both parents and children of recent African immigrant and refugee population. Mood disorders are often minimized and mental illness stigmatized. Acculturative stress brought about by many factors including the loss of social roles due to the breakdown of traditional structure of community, is taking a toll on older members of the community. Reports of domestic violence, child abuse, alcoholism, truancy, gang violence involvement, underemployment and unemployment are on the rise indicating a community in crisis.