Judgments Of Sexual Orientation Research Articles

Judgments of gay and heterosexual male speakers of American English: Which consonants do listeners rely on to form their sexual orientation judgments?

Prior research demonstrated that, upon hearing a single phone, listeners differentiated between gay and heterosexual male talkers of American English. For instance, researchers found that listeners relied on three consonants (e.g., /l/, /n/, and /s/) to form their judgments. It is unclear whether these findings could be replicated and whether there are additional consonants that listeners used. To further explore this, 23 consonants were examined (e.g., /b/, /v/, /s/, /n/, /t/, /f/, /ɛr/, /dʒ/, /θ/, /k/, /ɹ/, /m/, /l/, /g/, /d/, /ʒ/, /w/, /p/, /ɛl/, /ʃ/, /z/, /j/, and /ð/). For 21 of these consonants, listeners heard two tokens each, and heard one token of /θ/ and /ð/. Results were mixed. Listeners relied on both instances of /s/, /w/, /ɛl/, and /z/ to form their judgments, while they relied on only one instance of /b/, /n/, /ɛr/, /dʒ/, /k/, /ɹ/, /l/, /d/, /ʒ/, /p/, and /j/. Listeners didn’t rely on any instances of /v/, /t/, /f/, /g/, /m/, and /ʃ/; they relied on /ð/ and did not rely on /θ/. The only consistent finding, across multiple experiments, is that participants used /s/. Under certain circumstances, they may use additional consonants, but it doesn’t appear as if they use them consistently.

Judgments of self-identified gay and heterosexual male speakers of American English: Which vowels do listeners rely on to form their sexual orientation judgments?

Prior research (Tracy et al., 2015) demonstrated that, upon hearing a single phone, listeners differentiated between gay and heterosexual male talkers of American English. For instance, listeners relied on seven vowels (e.g., /æ/, /eɪ/, /ε/, /iː/, /oʊ/, /ɑ/, and /uː/) to form their judgments. From this particular finding, it is unclear whether the results could be replicated and whether these are the only vowels that listeners rely on; it is possible that listeners might rely on additional vowels. To further explore these issues, the present study examined a wider range of vowels (e.g., /i:/, /ɪ/, /eɪ/, /ɛ/, /æ/, /ɑɹ/, /ɑ/, /ɔ/, /oʊ/, /u:/, /ai/, /aʊ/, /ɔɪ/, /ɪr/, / ^/, and /ju/) and, in most instances, presented two different tokens of each vowel to listeners. Some tokens of a vowel (e.g., /i:/, /ɛ/, /æ/, /oʊ/, /u:/, and /ju/) came from a stressed syllable and some tokens came from an unstressed syllable. Only four vowels (e.g., /ɔ/, /aʊ/, /ɔɪ/, and / ^/) were presented once. Across all instances of every vowel, participants were able to significantly discriminate between gay and heterosexual speakers. Thus, listeners use a wide range of vowels to form their sexual orientation judgments of male talkers.

Crosslinguistic perceptions of /s/ among English, French, and German listeners

AbstractThis study reports the results of a crosslinguistic matched guise test examining /s/ and pitch variation in judgments of sexual orientation and nonnormative masculinity among English, French, and German listeners. Listeners responded to /s/ and pitch manipulations in native and other language stimuli (English, French, German, and Estonian). All listener groups rate higher pitch guises as more gay- and effeminate-sounding than lower pitch guises. However, only English listeners hear [s+] guises as more gay- and effeminate-sounding than [s] or [s−] guises for all stimuli languages. French and German listeners do not hear [s+] guises as more gay- or effeminate-sounding in any stimulus language, despite this feature's presence in native speech production. English listener results show evidence of indexical transfer, when indexical knowledge is applied to the perception of unknown languages. French and German listener results show how the enregistered status of /s/ variation affects perception, despite crosslinguistic similarities in production.

The perception of sexual orientation through speech: Generational change

Previous research has shown that listeners can perceive the sexual orientation of some lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) people at a greater than chance levels based on the acoustic-perceptual characteristics of their speech (Munson et al., J. Phonetics [2006], Pierrehumbert et al., J. Acoust. Soc. Am. [2004]). The cues to these judgments were the pronunciation of specific sounds (i.e., /æ/, /ɛ/, /oʊ/, /u/, /s/), rather than global speech characteristics (like f0 range or formant-frequency scaling). In the years since those studies were conducted, societal attitudes toward LGB people have changed substantially. Moreover, ongoing sound changes have affected the pronunciation of many of the sounds that cued judgments of sexual orientation from speech. The current study examines whether these changes affect the perception of sexual orientation through speech. The perception experiments described in Munson et al. are being redone using two groups of listeners. One group is matched in age to subjects whose data were reported previously (i.e, currently 18-30 years old). The second group that is matched in birth year to the subjects from the earlier study (i.e., currently 33-45 years old). Ongoing analyses compare these new data are compared to those from Munson et al.

Evidence for the Absence of Stimulus Quality Differences in Tests of the Accuracy of Sexual Orientation Judgments: A Reply to Cox, Devine, Bischmann, and Hyde (2016)

An article recently published in this journal (Cox, Devine, Bischmann, & Hyde, 2016) questioned the validity of existing research on the accurate judgment of sexual orientation from photographs of faces. Specifically, those authors reported a confound in their stimuli whereby the photos of sexual minorities (gay men and lesbians) were of higher quality than the photos of heterosexuals. Based on this finding, they concluded that the accuracy in judging sexual orientation from faces demonstrated in the broader literature is an artifact of stimulus quality differences. Here, we addressed this claim by systematically testing the numerous photo sets that we have used in 61 studies documenting accurate judgments of sexual orientation from facial cues published since 2007. Contrary to their claim, the overwhelming majority of studies (93%) showed no significant differences in photo quality according to sexual orientation. Of those that did show differences, most revealed that heterosexual targets’ photos were actually of higher quality than sexual minority targets’ photos – opposite of what Cox et al. found. In addition, we highlight additional research using stimuli equated for quality differences overlooked in the recent article by Cox et al., lending further support to the conclusion that sexual orientation is legible from multiple sensory cues.

Straight until proven gay: A systematic bias toward straight categorizations in sexual orientation judgments.

Perceivers achieve above chance accuracy judging others' sexual orientations, but they also exhibit a notable response bias by categorizing most targets as straight rather than gay. Although a straight categorization bias is evident in many published reports, it has never been the focus of systematic inquiry. The current studies therefore document this bias and test the mechanisms that produce it. Studies 1-3 revealed the straight categorization bias cannot be explained entirely by perceivers' attempts to match categorizations to the number of gay targets in a stimulus set. Although perceivers were somewhat sensitive to base rate information, their tendency to categorize targets as straight persisted when they believed each target had a 50% chance of being gay (Study 1), received explicit information about the base rate of gay targets in a stimulus set (Study 2), and encountered stimulus sets with varying base rates of gay targets (Study 3). The remaining studies tested an alternate mechanism for the bias based upon perceivers' use of gender heuristics when judging sexual orientation. Specifically, Study 4 revealed the range of gendered cues compelling gay judgments is smaller than the range of gendered cues compelling straight judgments despite participants' acknowledgment of equal base rates for gay and straight targets. Study 5 highlighted perceptual experience as a cause of this imbalance: Exposing perceivers to hyper-gendered faces (e.g., masculine men) expanded the range of gendered cues compelling gay categorizations. Study 6 linked this observation to our initial studies by demonstrating that visual exposure to hyper-gendered faces reduced the magnitude of the straight categorization bias. Collectively, these studies provide systematic evidence of a response bias in sexual orientation categorization and offer new insights into the mechanisms that produce it. (PsycINFO Database Record

Judgments of self-identified gay and heterosexual male speakers of American English: Certain phonemes are more salient than others in determining sexual orientation

Prior research (Munson, McDonald, DeBoe, & White, 2006; Tracy, Bainter, & Satariano, 2015) has demonstrated that, upon hearing a relatively short utterance, listeners were able to differentiate between self-identified gay and heterosexual male speakers of American English. Furthermore, Tracy et al. (2015) discovered that listeners primarily relied on certain vowels (e.g., /ae/, /eɪ/, /e/, /iː/, /oʊ/, /ɑ/, and /uː/) and consonants (e.g., /l/, /n/, and /s/) to determine a speaker’s sexual orientation. The present study, based on data collected by Tracy (2015), investigated whether listeners relied on other phonemes when forming their sexual orientation judgments. Listeners were presented with utterances that either included one, two, or three consonants, or one, two, or three vowels. Upon hearing a single phone, such as /ɪ/, /^/, /ɹ/, /θ/, and /j/, listeners were able to differentiate between the speakers. With respect to the consonants, listeners’ performance improved as the number of certain consonants (e.g., /l/, /n/, /ɹ/, /θ/, and /j/) in the utterance increased. For example, the utterance /ɹ, j, θ/ resulted in better performance than the utterance /f, m, v/. The results indicate that certain phonemes, more than others, can indicate a speaker’s sexual orientation.

Vowels or consonants: Which is more effective in distinguishing between self-identified gay and heterosexual male speakers of American English?

Previous research (Tracy & Satariano, 2011) investigated how listeners were able to distinguish between self-identified gay and heterosexual male speakers of American English. In one experiment, listeners heard greater and greater portions of utterances that followed a CVC pattern (/m/, /mae/, and /maes/), and their judgments significantly improved upon hearing the second phone. It was unclear if this result was due to the second phone being a vowel or because it was an additional phone. It was hypothesized that judgments would improve if listeners heard additional phones. Furthermore, listeners would primarily rely on vowels, and not consonants, to form their judgments. This hypothesis was tested in the present experiment. Listeners heard utterances that contained one, two, or three consonants, and one, two or three vowels. The results demonstrated that sexual orientation judgments improved if the utterances contained three phones compared to one phone. It was also discovered that the listeners were better...

Longer words or shorter words: Which one is more effective in distinguishing between self-identified gay and heterosexual male speakers?

Prior research demonstrated that listeners relied primarily on vowels to determine a male speaker’s sexual orientation (Tracy and Satariano, 2011). Additionally, listeners became more confident in their sexual orientation judgments if the utterance included more vowels (Tracy, 2013). Since multisyllabic utterances also contain more consonants, are listeners’ judgments based on the number of vowels or consonants in an utterance? To investigate this question, monosyllabic, bisyllabic, and trisyllabic words were selected. Within each group of words, the number of phones varied. For example, a trisyllabic word contained either seven phones (“division”) or nine phones (“contribute”). Listeners became more confident of the speaker’s sexual orientation if the word included more vowels. With respect to the monosyllabic and bisyllabic items, listeners were less confident if the number of consonants in the word increased. Ratings were more confident for “have” compared to “help”. The results for the trisyllabic words differed. Listeners became more confident if the word contained more consonants. “Contribute” resulted in more confident ratings than “division”. The results demonstrated that listeners were more confident in the speaker’s sexual orientation if the word included more vowels, but under certain conditions, confidence ratings did not improve if the utterance included additional consonants.

Shape Differences Between the Faces of Homosexual and Heterosexual Men

Previous studies have shown that homosexual men differ from heterosexual men in several somatic traits and lay people accurately attribute sexual orientation based on facial images. Thus, we may predict that morphological differences between faces of homosexual and heterosexual individuals can cue to sexual orientation. The main aim of this study was to test for possible differences in facial shape between heterosexual and homosexual men. Further, we tested whether self-reported sexual orientation correlated with sexual orientation and masculinity-femininity attributed from facial images by independent raters. In Study 1, we used geometric morphometrics to test for differences in facial shape between homosexual and heterosexual men. The analysis revealed significant shape differences in faces of heterosexual and homosexual men. Homosexual men showed relatively wider and shorter faces, smaller and shorter noses, and rather massive and more rounded jaws, resulting in a mosaic of both feminine and masculine features. In Study 2, we tested the accuracy of sexual orientation judgment from standardized facial photos which were assessed by 80 independent raters. Binary logistic regression showed no effect of attributed sexual orientation on self-reported sexual orientation. However, homosexual men were rated as more masculine than heterosexual men, which may explain the misjudgment of sexual orientation. Thus, our results showed that differences in facial morphology of homosexual and heterosexual men do not simply mirror variation in femininity, and the stereotypic association of feminine looking men as homosexual may confound judgments of sexual orientation.

The politics of gaydar: Ideological differences in the use of gendered cues in categorizing sexual orientation.

In the present research, we investigated whether, because of differences in cognitive style, liberals and conservatives would differ in the process of categorizing individuals into a perceptually ambiguous group. In 3 studies, we examined whether conservatives were more likely than liberals to rely on gender inversion cues (e.g., feminine = gay) when categorizing male faces as gay vs. straight, and the accuracy implications of differential cue usage. In Study 1, perceivers made dichotomous sexual orientation judgments (gay-straight). We found that perceivers who reported being more liberal were less likely than perceivers who reported being more conservative to use gender inversion cues in their deliberative judgments. In addition, liberals took longer to categorize targets, suggesting that they may have been thinking more about their judgments. Consistent with a stereotype correction model of social categorization, in Study 2 we demonstrated that differences between liberals and conservatives were eliminated by a cognitive load manipulation that disrupted perceivers' abilities to engage in effortful processing. Under cognitive load, liberals failed to adjust their initial judgments and, like conservatives, consistently relied on gender inversion cues to make judgments. In Study 3, we provided more direct evidence that differences in cognitive style underlie ideological differences in judgments of sexual orientation. Specifically, liberals were less likely than conservatives to endorse stereotypes about gender inversion and sexual orientation, and this difference in stereotype endorsement was partially explained by liberals' greater need for cognition. Implications for the accuracy of ambiguous category judgments made with the use of stereotypical cues in naturalistic settings are discussed.

The roles of featural and configural face processing in snap judgments of sexual orientation.

Research has shown that people are able to judge sexual orientation from faces with above-chance accuracy, but little is known about how these judgments are formed. Here, we investigated the importance of well-established face processing mechanisms in such judgments: featural processing (e.g., an eye) and configural processing (e.g., spatial distance between eyes). Participants judged sexual orientation from faces presented for 50 milliseconds either upright, which recruits both configural and featural processing, or upside-down, when configural processing is strongly impaired and featural processing remains relatively intact. Although participants judged women’s and men’s sexual orientation with above-chance accuracy for upright faces and for upside-down faces, accuracy for upside-down faces was significantly reduced. The reduced judgment accuracy for upside-down faces indicates that configural face processing significantly contributes to accurate snap judgments of sexual orientation.

Judgments of Sexual Orientation and Masculinity–Femininity Based on Thin Slices of Behavior: A Cross-Cultural Comparison

Studies of North Americans suggest that laypeople can judge the sexual orientation of others with greater than chance accuracy based on brief observations of their behavior (i.e., "gaydar" exists). One factor that appears to contribute to these judgments is targets' degree of masculinity-femininity. However, behaviors related to sexual orientation and to masculinity-femininity might vary across cultures. Thus, cross-cultural work is needed to test whether judgments of sexual orientation are more accurate when targets and raters are from the same culture. American and Czech male targets, 38 homosexual and 41 heterosexual, were videotaped and brief segments of the videotapes were presented to American and Czech raters. Overall, raters' judgments of targets' sexual orientation were related to targets' self-reported sexual orientation. However, the relationship was stronger when targets were judged by raters from their own country. In general, results suggest that there are both cross-cultural similarities and differences in gaydar and in cues related to sexual orientation.

At the crossroads of conspicuous and concealable: what race categories communicate about sexual orientation.

We found that judgments of a perceptually ambiguous social category, sexual orientation, varied as a function of a perceptually obvious social category, race. Sexual orientation judgments tend to exploit a heuristic of gender inversion that often promotes accuracy. We predicted that an orthogonal social category that is itself gendered, race, would impact both sexual orientation categorizations and their accuracy. Importantly, overlaps in both the phenotypes and stereotypes associated with specific race and sex categories (e.g., the categories Black and Men and the categories Asian and Women) lead race categories to be decidedly gendered. Therefore, we reasoned that race categories would bias judgments of sexual orientation and their accuracy because of the inherent gendered nature. Indeed, both gay and straight perceivers in the United States were more likely to judge targets to be gay when target race was associated with gender-atypical stereotypes or phenotypes (e.g., Asian Men). Perceivers were also most accurate when judging the sexual orientation of the most strongly gender-stereotyped groups (i.e., Asian Women and Black Men), but least accurate when judging the sexual orientation of counter-stereotypical groups (i.e., Asian men and Black Women). Signal detection analyses confirmed that this pattern of accuracy was achieved because of heightened sensitivity to cues in groups who more naturally conform to gendered stereotypes (Asian Women and Black Men). Implications for social perception are discussed.

Sexual Orientation Perception Involves Gendered Facial Cues

Perceivers can accurately judge a face's sexual orientation, but the perceptual mechanisms mediating this remain obscure. The authors hypothesized that stereotypes casting gays and lesbians as gender "inverts," in cultural circulation for a century and a half, lead perceivers to use gendered facial cues to infer sexual orientation. Using computer-generated faces, Study 1 showed that as two facial dimensions (shape and texture) became more gender inverted, targets were more likely to be judged as gay or lesbian. Study 2 showed that real faces appearing more gender inverted were more likely to be judged as gay or lesbian. Furthermore, the stereotypic use of gendered cues influenced the accurate judgment of sexual orientation. Although using gendered cues increased the accuracy of sexual orientation judgments overall, Study 3 showed that judgments were reliably mistaken for targets that countered stereotypes. Together, the findings demonstrate that perceivers utilize gendered facial cues to glean another's sexual orientation, and this influences the accuracy or error of judgments.

Teaching & Learning Guide for: Loose Lips and Silver Tongues, or, Projecting Sexual Orientation Through Speech

Teaching & Learning Guide for: Loose Lips and Silver Tongues, or, Projecting Sexual Orientation Through Speech

The Acoustic Correlates of Perceived Masculinity, Perceived Femininity, and Perceived Sexual Orientation

Previous studies have shown that a subset of gay, lesbian, and bisexual (GLB) and heterosexual adults produce distinctive patterns of phonetic variation that allow listeners to detect their sexual orientation from audio-only samples of read speech. The current investigation examined the extent to which judgments of sexual orientation from speech are related to judgments of masculinity or femininity made by an independent group of listeners. It also examined the acoustic measures that predict perceived sexual orientation and perceived masculinity/femininity. Ten listeners judged the perceived masculinity or femininity of 44 talkers (11 heterosexual men, 11 heterosexual women, 11 gay men, and 11 lesbian or bisexual women). These were compared to measures of the talkers' perceived sexual orientation, and to acoustic measures of the talker's speech. Listeners judged gay men to sound less masculine than heterosexual men, and lesbian/bisexual women to sound less feminine than heterosexual women. These measures were significantly correlated with measures of perceived sexual orientation. Regression analyses showed that different sets of acoustic measures predicated perceived sexual orientation and perceived masculinity/femininity, and that some acoustic measures were more strongly correlated with one perceptual measure than the other. Results suggest that perceived sexual orientation, perceived masculinity, and perceived femininity are distinct but correlated perceptual parameters.

Accuracy of judgments of sexual orientation from thin slices of behavior.

Accuracy of judgments of sexual orientation from thin slices of behavior.

Accuracy of judgments of sexual orientation from thin slices of behavior.

In this research the authors examined the accuracy of judging sexual orientation on the basis of brief observations or "thin slices" of nonverbal behavior. In Study 1, sexual orientation was judged more accurately than chance, with judgments being more accurate when based on dynamic nonverbal behavior (10-s and 1-s silent video segments) than on static information (a series of 8 still photographs). Gay men and lesbians were more accurate than heterosexuals in judging still photographs and 1-s clips but not in 10-s clips. In Study 2, judgments based on 10-s dynamic figural outline displays containing primarily gestural information were more accurate than chance.