Minority Stress & Mental Health for Sexual Minority Adults from Religious Families: the Role of Religious Coping

Abstract

ABSTRACT Background A majority of sexual minority (SM; lesbian, gay, bisexual, queer) adults identify as religious and use religious copingstrategies for dealing with life’s stressors. SM people report experiencingunique minority stressors of interpersonal rejection in family and religioussettings as a product of religious doctrine that rejects same-sex relationshipsand attraction; however, the usefulness of religious coping strategies forhandling minority stressors for improving the mental health of SM people isstill unknown given mixed findings in previous studies. In addition, locatingparticular measures of religiously based minority stress may aid in identifyingkey factors affecting mental health. Method This study utilized quantitative data from a web-based survey to explore the relationships between religious coping,interpersonal religious discontent, minority stressors of family rejection andinternalized stigma, and depressive symptoms of SM adults from religiousfamilies (n = 384). Results Moderation analysis demonstrated the significant interaction of religious coping and interpersonal religious discontent withminority stress factors for exacerbating the influence of greater minoritystress on greater depressive symptoms when religious coping and interpersonalreligious discontent were higher. In addition, those who left their religiousaffiliations experienced decreased minority stress and used less religiouscoping strategies. Conclusions Implications for family psychotherapy and future research are addressed.