Nurses’ Implicit Attitudes Regarding Sexual and Gender Minorities

Abstract

Negative health impacts exist for individuals who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, or something other than heterosexual are critical. Nurses are on the front lines of delivering holistic patient care to everyone, and their potential biases regarding this vulnerable population may negatively affect care. The study used scores from two tests designed to measure implicit bias in individuals towards sexual and gender minorities (SGM). A retrospective design with secondary data from Project Implicit was conducted using the Transgender (2020) and Sexuality (2006 to 2020) Implicit Association Tests (IATs). We compared mean Transgender IAT scores of nurses to other health-related professions (n = 53,586) and investigated differences between nurses’ Transgender IAT scores and self-identified explicit attitudes (n = 1558). A time-series of nurses’ Sexuality IAT scores was also explored (N = 25,791). Our study findings demonstrated that nurses held the strongest implicit preference for cisgender people compared to other occupational groups. No significant difference was found between nurses’ implicit and explicit preferences. Nurses’ implicit attitudes about sexual orientation have trended toward less biased scores. Comprehensive nursing education and implementation of nursing practices that promote health and well-being for sexual and gender minority patients are needed to reduce biases and continue this trend.