An alternative measure for attitudes toward bisexual people.

Abstract

Existing measures of attitudes toward bisexual people combine items assessing people's attitudes, specific stereotypes, and specific behavioral intentions regarding this sexual minority, despite some theoretical differences between these constructs. Because attitudes reflect general evaluation of a target, specific stereotypical beliefs and behavioral intentions may not be appropriate for assessing one's attitudes toward bisexual people. In addition, although attitudes, stereotypes, and behavioral intentions are theoretically similar, mixing their indicators in a single attitudinal measure may overemphasize their similarities and underscore their differences. The purpose of the current study was to create well-defined measures of these constructs that highlight their distinctions but also retain their similarities. The responses to the newly created measures were collected online from 377 U.S. Amazon Mechanical Turk (MTurk) workers (88% heterosexual, 75% White, 57% men, median age 32 years). Common factor analyses were performed to determine the factor structure of the measures. According to several exploratory data analyses, these measures showed moderately strong but heterogeneous intercorrelations and somewhat differing patterns of gender differences. Together, both the social psychology literature and the current empirical evidence imply that it might be a better practice to assess attitudes, stereotypes, and behavioral intentions regarding bisexual people using distinct and clear-cut measures. Assessing and examining these constructs separately can generate research findings regarding (a) how the intercorrelations between attitudes, stereotypes, and behavioral intentions regarding bisexuals would change across different contexts and (b) how these constructs would be differentially related to their purported causes and consequences. These research findings would help us better understand and cope with prejudice against bisexual individuals. Public Significance StatementThis study revealed some differences in the psychometric properties between measures assessing attitudes, stereotypes, and behavioral intentions regarding bisexual people; thus, recommending the practice of assessing and examining these constructs using separate measures. This practice can provide insights regarding (a) how the interrelationships between attitudes, stereotypes, and behavioral intentions regarding bisexuals would change across different contexts and (b) how these constructs would be differentially related to their purported causes and consequences.