Social and personality psychologists aim to “understand individuals in their social contexts for the benefit of all people” (Society for Personality and Social Psychology, n.d.). Though this mission is admirable, value statements do little, on their own, to create an inclusive, high-quality science that benefits humanity broadly. In this research, we evaluate relationship science, a major subfield of social–personality psychology, illustrating both the unique diversity-relevant challenges faced by particular subfields and the barriers to inclusive and diverse research that are shared across research areas. Specifically, we examine the sample diversity and reporting practices of 1,762 studies published in eight mainstream psychology and relationships journals at two time points—(a) 1996–2000 and (b) 2016–2020—and center our analysis around five focal sample characteristics: gender, sexual orientation, regional context, socioeconomic status (SES), and race. We find that reporting practices and representation have not improved for some core demographic characteristics (e.g., socioeconomic status) and that even in domains for which reporting practices have improved (e.g., sexual orientation), reporting remains limited. Further, we find that reporting practices in relationship science frequently center Whiteness (e.g., “participants were mostly White”), obscure or overlook potential sexual orientation diversity (e.g., implying that individuals in man–woman dyads are “heterosexual”), and treat the United States as the contextual default (e.g., participants came from a “large Southeastern university”). In light of these findings, we offer recommendations that we hope will cultivate a more representative and inclusive discipline.

Though consent forms include important information, those experienced with behavioral research often observe that participants do not carefully read consent forms. Three studies examined participants’ reading of consent forms for in-person experiments. In each study, we inserted the phrase “some researchers wear yellow pants” into sections of the consent form and measured participants’ reading of the form by testing their recall of the color yellow. In Study 1, we found that the majority of participants did not read consent forms thoroughly. This suggests that overall, participants sign consent forms that they have not read, confirming what has been observed anecdotally and documented in other research domains. Study 2 examined which sections of consent forms participants read and found that participants were more likely to read the first 2 sections of a consent form (procedure and risks) than later sections (benefits and anonymity and confidentiality). Given that rates of recall of the target phrase were under 70% even when the sentence was inserted into earlier sections of the form, we explored ways to improve participant reading in Study 3. Theorizing that the presence of a researcher may influence participants’ retention of the form, we assigned participants to read the form with or without a researcher present. Results indicated that removing the researcher from the room while participants read the consent form decreased recall of the target phrase. Implications of these results and suggestions for future researchers are discussed.

Bi+ people—those who are attracted to multiple gender groups and who use labels such as bisexual, pansexual, queer, or fluid—encounter challenges related to making their identities visible and experience reduced well-being relative to their gay/lesbian and heterosexual peers. In a sample of 450 bi+ participants, we pursue two primary goals. First, we investigate whether the subjective feeling that one's bi+ identity is invisible is associated with lower well-being among bi+ individuals. Second, we identify circumstances under which bi+ people experience lower versus higher subjective identity invisibility, focusing on the influential role of romantic relationships. We find that subjective visibility is positively associated with well-being, particularly for individuals whose bi+ identities are central to them. Relationship factors supporting a sense of perceived visibility included being in a same-gender relationship and having a gay, lesbian, or bi+ partner. This study contributes to efforts to identify conditions that promote bi+ people's well-being and highlights the importance of attending to the relationship dynamics of bi+ people, an understudied population.

Across three experiments (total N = 1,149), we examine whether bisexual men (more so than women) are viewed as similar to their same-gender gay counterparts and whether bisexual women (more so than men) are viewed as similar to their same-gender heterosexual counterparts. We find support for the notion that bisexual men are stereotyped as more similar to their gay counterparts than bisexual women are. These perceptions of bisexual targets’ stereotypical similarity to their gay counterparts were linked to identity-denying perceptions that bisexual individuals are “actually gay,” a belief held more strongly about bisexual men (vs. women). Bisexual men and women were viewed as possessing stereotypically heterosexual characteristics to similar extents, although bisexual women (vs. men) were indeed more strongly characterized by the identity-denying belief that they are “actually heterosexual.” Collectively, these findings suggest that bisexual men and women encounter different challenges to their identities that may require different interventions.