Depressive symptoms among mostly heterosexual adolescents

Maheux, Anne J.; Bryen, Chloe P.; Carrino, Emily A.; Stewart, Jennifer; Widman, Laura; Choukas‐Bradley, Sophia

doi:10.1080/19359705.2020.1843583

Cited by 1 publication

(1 citation statement)

References 39 publications

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“…The present study found that manipulating participants beliefs about sexual orientation changed how they interpreted their sexual/romantic experiences and the subsequent global assessment they made when rating their sexual orientation. As considerable effort has been undertaken to understand mental health 45 , 46 , substance use 47 , 48 , sexual health 49 – 51 , discrimination 52 , and even physiological differences 43 , 53 – 57 between exclusive and non-exclusive heterosexual individuals, clarifying the cognitive and attitudinal variables that may predispose a heterosexual person to adopt respective labels is surely important if we are interested in the causes of differences (e.g., mental health, sexual health) between exclusive heterosexual and non-exclusive heterosexual populations.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Exposure to continuous or fluid theories of sexual orientation leads some heterosexuals to embrace less-exclusive heterosexual orientations

Morandini

Dacosta

Dar‐Nimrod

2021

Sci Rep

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We examined whether heterosexual individuals’ self-reported sexual orientation could be influenced experimentally by manipulating their knowledge of the nature of sexual orientation. In Study 1 (180 university students, 66% female) participants read summaries describing evidence for sexual orientation existing on a continuum versus discrete categories or a control manipulation, and in Study 2 (460 participants in a nationally representative Qualtrics panel, 50% female) additionally read summaries describing sexual orientation as fluid versus stable across the life-course. After reading summaries, participants answered various questions about their sexual orientation. In Study 1, political moderates and progressives (but not conservatives) who read the continuous manipulation subsequently reported being less exclusively heterosexual, and regardless of political alignment, participants reported less certainty about their sexual orientation, relative to controls. In Study 2, after exposure to fluid or continuous manipulations heterosexual participants were up to five times more likely than controls to rate themselves as non-exclusively heterosexual. Additionally, those in the continuous condition reported less certainty about their sexual orientation and were more willing to engage in future same-sex sexual experiences, than those in the control condition. These results suggest that non-traditional theories of sexual orientation can lead heterosexuals to embrace less exclusive heterosexual orientations.

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