Utilizing data from several studies done at Texas A&M University during the last 12 years, this paper develops a systematic interpretation of the idea of "minority-group orientation" and tests the adequacy of these concepts as an aid to understanding potential diversity among rural Mexican American youth with regard to intergroup fusion. The paper lists three major levels of interpenetration (cultural, social-structural, and psychological) and elaborates on four subtypes under each major level. An assessment of the data as it relates to the interpenetration levels produces these conclusions: (1) few rural Mexican American youth desire extreme ethnic differentiation; (2) a substantial amount of diversity exists in both nature and degree; (3) the major type of orientation desired across the level-type in each case represents "substantial" but not "complete" fusion; (4) in terms of cultural and social-structural fusion, subjects were possibly not uniformly in favor of comprehensive intergroup fusion; (5) females are more likely to be assimilation-oriented than males. (CM)