The Relationship Between Women's Sexual Identity and Perceived Wellness

Bidentity: Sexual Behavior/Identity Congruence and Women's Sexual, Physical and Mental Well-Being

“…As hypothesized, the mental, physical and sexual well-being of participants whose sexual identity was congruent with their recent sexual behavior was significantly more positive than the wellbeing of participants whose identity and recent behavior were incongruent. This finding conflicts with previous research that did not find a significant difference in reported mental/physical health based upon behavior/identity congruence (Ketz & Israel, 2002). The discrepant findings may be attributable to the use of different measures to assess sexual behavior and well-being, different measurement timeframes (30 days vs. 1 year) and/or different sample sizes and recruitment strategies.…”

“…Specifically, sexual behavior/identity congruence has been linked to higher rates of HIV testing and condom use among homosexually/gay-identified men (Pathela et al, 2006) and regular mammograms and gynecological exams among lesbian-identified women (Kerker, Mostashari, & Thorpe, 2006). In contrast, a study by Ketz and Israel (2002) did not find a significant relationship between behavior/identity congruence and perceived wellness. Although the nonsignificant finding may be an accurate depiction of the relationship between behavior/identity congruence and health, it may also be due to methodological limitations (e.g., a small sample size).…”

“…In this study, we explored the role of sexual behavior/identity congruence in women's sexual, physical and mental well-being using a more robust sample and comprehensive measure of well-being relative to earlier work (Ketz & Israel, 2002). First, we hypothesized that women with behavior/identity congruence (e.g., lesbian-identified women who engaged in sexual activity with only female partners in the past 30 days) would report greater well-being across domains versus women with behavior/identity incongruence (e.g., lesbian-identified women who engaged in sexual activity with male partners over the past 30 days).…”

An Empirical Study into the Relationship between Bisexual Identity Congruence, Internalized Biphobia and Infidelity among Bisexual Women

“…Some of this lack of identity integration may be reflected in the many studies showing low correspondence rates between desires, sexual behaviors and self-labeling among individuals who have attractions to men and women (Amestoy, 2001;Fox, 2003;Ketz & Israel, 2002;Rust, 2001). Many people who have both-gender attractions feel ambivalent about self-labeling as "bisexual" due to stigma surrounding the term (Brown, 2002;Diamond, 2008;Rust, 2001) or inaccuracy or incompleteness of the term (Berenson, 2002).…”

Relationship Between Psychological Well-Being and Perceived Wellness in Online Graduate Counselor Education Students

“…The PWS is theoretically based, measures observed functioning multidimensionally and considered the balance between the dimensions. Its focus is on health, rather than illness (Adams, Bezner, & Steinhardt, 1995;Adams et al, 2000) and has been used by several researchers to measure perceived wellness Byron & Miller-Perrin, 2009;Dolbier, Soderstrom, & Steinhardt, 2001;Harari, Waehler, & Rogers, 2005;Jewell, 2005;Ketz & Israel, 2002;Kinney, Rodgers, Nash, & Bray, 2003;Sidman, D'Abundo, & Hritz, 2009). …”