Gender Nonconformity of Bisexual Men and Women

Rieger, Gerulf; Holmes, Luke; Watts-Overall, Tuesday M.; Gruia, Dragos C.; Bailey, J. Michael; Savin‐Williams, Ritch C.

doi:10.1007/s10508-020-01766-z

Cited by 17 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 36 publications

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“…We decided against including bisexual individuals in the study for several reasons. While there is some evidence to suggest a level of gender nonconformity also in bisexual individuals, they are not as gender nonconforming: Some reports suggest that their level of gender nonconformity is intermediate between heterosexual and homosexual individuals (e.g., Rieger et al, 2020 ). Moreover, it is likely that mental health risk among bisexuals might be unique to bisexual people, and while it may also be related to their gender nonconformity, this relationship is probably less strong than in exclusively gay/lesbian people.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Childhood Gender Nonconformity and Recalled Perceived Parental and Peer Acceptance Thereof, Internalized Homophobia, and Psychological Well-Being Outcomes in Heterosexual and Gay Men from Poland

2022

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The link between gender nonconformity and psychopathology may be due in part to negative childhood experiences resulting from other people’s reactions to gender nonconformity. The aim of this study was to test whether recalled perceived levels of parental and peer acceptance of childhood gender nonconforming behaviors and play mediate the relationship of childhood gender nonconformity with depression and social anxiety in adulthood. We also tested whether this relationship was moderated by sexual orientation and, among gay men, whether internalized homophobia was an additional mediator. All variables were measured in a large sample of male participants using self-report (n = 449 gay men, age: M = 27.8 years, SD = 6.69; and n = 296 heterosexual men, age: M = 27.4 years, SD = 6.57) in Poland. Gay men reported more childhood gender nonconformity than heterosexual men. The relationship between gender nonconformity and depressive symptoms as well as social anxiety symptoms was significant in both gay and heterosexual men. Among gay men, this relationship was partially mediated by peer but not parental acceptance of the measured aspects of gender nonconformity and internalized homophobia. Among heterosexual men, recalled perceived parental acceptance of gender nonconformity partially mediated the relationship between gender nonconformity and depressive and social anxiety symptoms. Our findings were partially in line with those found in Western European and North American samples. Although the two groups differed in their recalled perceived gender nonconformity, they did not differ in their depression or social anxiety scores. Nevertheless, childhood gender nonconformity may be an indirect risk associated with mental health symptoms, irrespective of sexual orientation. Its higher prevalence among nonheterosexual individuals makes it a particular risk for this group.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Childhood Gender Nonconformity and Recalled Perceived Parental and Peer Acceptance Thereof, Internalized Homophobia, and Psychological Well-Being Outcomes in Heterosexual and Gay Men from Poland

2022

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“…A final point concerns bisexual women, who were intermediate between heterosexual and homosexual women in their sexual arousal and masculinity-femininity, but were significantly more feminine in their 2D:4D. One hypothesis is that due to intermediate dosages of genetic or prenatal hormonal influences, bisexual individuals, who could be considered to have sexual orientations between heterosexual and homosexual, also fall intermediate with respect to correlates of sexual orientation (Rieger et al, 2020). Thus, regarding bisexual women's 2D:4D, we assumed that they could also be intermediate between heterosexual and homosexual women on this measure.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sexual Orientation, Sexual Arousal, and Finger Length Ratios in Women

et al. 2021

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In general, women show physiological sexual arousal to both sexes. However, compared with heterosexual women, homosexual women are more aroused to their preferred sex, a pattern typically found in men. We hypothesized that homosexual women’s male-typical arousal is due to their sex-atypical masculinization during prenatal development. We measured the sexual responses of 199 women (including 67 homosexual women) via their genital arousal and pupil dilation to female and male sexual stimuli. Our main marker of masculinization was the ratio of the index to ring finger, which we expected to be lower (a masculine pattern) in homosexual women due to increased levels of prenatal androgens. We further measured observer- and self-ratings of psychological masculinity–femininity as possible proxies of prenatal androgenization. Homosexual women responded more strongly to female stimuli than male stimuli and therefore had more male-typical sexual responses than heterosexual women. However, they did not have more male-typical digit ratios, even though this difference became stronger if analyses were restricted to white participants. Still, variation in women's digit ratios did not account for the link between their sexual orientation and their male-typical sexual responses. Furthermore, homosexual women reported and displayed more masculinity than heterosexual women, but their masculinity was not associated with their male-typical sexual arousal. Thus, women’s sexual and behavioral traits, and potential anatomical traits, are possibly masculinized at different stages of gestation.

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“…However, there is evidence of comorbidity not only among mental conditions, but also between mental and physical con ditions, as shown by studies pointing to transdiagnostic asso ciations across a wide range of physical and mental disorders 1,5 . These findings suggest that there may be another factor that ac counts for the individuals' propensity to develop mental as well as physical conditions, that we termed the "d" (for disease) factor 6 .…”

Section: Childhood Gender Non-conformity Sexual Orientation and Menta...mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Prior research on this topic has focused primarily on non‐probability‐based samples of young people and sexual or gender identity minority groups, documenting strong links between childhood gender non‐conformity and both non‐heterosexuality and non‐cisgender identity 3‐5 . Same‐sex oriented individuals considerably more often report childhood gender non‐conformity than heterosexual peers, and it has been suggested that childhood gender non‐conformity might, at least in part, explain the excess mental morbidity observed among sexual minorities 6,7 .…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%