Attitudes Toward Gay Men and Lesbian Women Moderate Heterosexual Adults’ Subjective Stress Response to Witnessing Homonegativity

Hunter Hahn,Woo-Young Ahn,Ilana Seager Van Dyk

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2019.02948

Hunter Hahn, Woo-Young Ahn + Show 1 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.02948

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Abstract

Minority stress theory posits that members of a stigmatized group, such as sexual minorities (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and other non-heterosexual individuals), are particularly subject to ill effects of minority-specific events (stressors), including overt homonegativity. Although adverse effects of homonegativity are well documented for sexual minorities, little is known about effects of witnessing homonegativity on heterosexual individuals. As a growing number of heterosexual individuals hold accepting views of sexual minority individuals, some detrimental effects of homonegativity may extend to heterosexual individuals. For example, prior studies demonstrate that when racial majority-group members witness discrimination against minority-group members, they may experience stress response, particularly if they hold positive attitudes toward the minority-group. In this experimental study, 263 heterosexual adults (Mage = 34.47 years, SD = 9.67, 51.7% female) were randomized to either witness homonegativity or to a control condition. Participants rated subjective stress on a 0–100 visual analogue scale both immediately before and after the film-based induction. Participants also completed a measure of their attitudes toward gay men and lesbian women. Moderation analyses indicated that participants who were more accepting of gay men and lesbian women experienced greater stress after the induction than those with less accepting views. Implications and limitations of these findings are discussed.

Highlights

Effects of stigma based on sexual orientation are well documented among sexual minorities
Its original and most extensive use is to explain health disparities among sexual minorities, the minority stress model has since been extended to other stigmatized groups (e.g., Hendricks and Testa, 2012; Sikorski et al, 2015). This model emphasizes that effects of minority stress exposure depend on identification as a member of a stigmatized group (Meyer, 2003). Those who identify as sexual minorities are susceptible to long-term adverse outcomes as a result of sexual orientation-related discrimination, whereas heterosexual individuals are not exposed to such stressors and are less vulnerable to the adverse mental health outcomes associated with minority stress
No outliers were identified for post-induction stress or the attitudes toward gay men/lesbian women measure

Summary

Introduction

Effects of stigma based on sexual orientation are well documented among sexual minorities (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and other non-heterosexual individuals; Meyer, 2003; Hatzenbuehler, 2009). Its original and most extensive use is to explain health disparities among sexual minorities, the minority stress model has since been extended to other stigmatized groups (e.g., Hendricks and Testa, 2012; Sikorski et al, 2015) This model emphasizes that effects of minority stress exposure depend on identification as a member of a stigmatized group (Meyer, 2003). In this case, those who identify as sexual minorities are susceptible to long-term adverse outcomes as a result of sexual orientation-related discrimination, whereas heterosexual individuals are not exposed to such stressors and are less vulnerable to the adverse mental health outcomes associated with minority stress. Both sexual minority and heterosexual individuals may experience the same objective event (e.g., witnessing homonegativity), yet only sexual minority individuals would be at risk for developing adverse outcomes as a result (Meyer, 2003)

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