Mental Health Issues for Sexual Minority Women by Unknown

Author:Unknown
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 1596743
Publisher: Taylor & Francis Group

SUMMARY. Data from a population-based survey of low-income young women (n = 2,438) was used to examine substance use patterns and exposure to coerced sexual activity among women who self-identify as lesbian (n = 34) or bisexual (n = 91), or who report sexual behavior exclusively with other women (n = 17) or with both women and men (n = 189). Findings for women classified by self-identity and by sexual behavior are compared. Women who identified as bisexual or lesbian reported higher rates of lifetime and recent substance use and were more likely to report experiences of coerced sex than women who identified as heterosexual. Women with both male and female sex partners reported higher rates of substance use and coerced sexual experiences than did women with male partners only. Heterosexual women with both male and female partners were more similar to self-identified bisexuals, compared to heterosexual women with male partners only. The implications of assessing multiple dimensions of sexual orientation in research focusing on lesbians’ mental health are discussed. [Article copies available for a fee from The Haworth Document Delivery Service: 1-800-HAWORTH. E-mail address: <[email protected]> Website: <http://www.HaworthPress.com> © 2003 by The Haworth Press, Inc. All rights reserved.]

KEYWORDS. Lesbian, sexual orientation, same-sex partners, alcohol use, drug use, sexual assault

Researchers examining health and mental health issues of women have generally taken one of two approaches to assessing or analyzing the sexual orientation of study participants. Most often researchers have relied on participants to self-identify as lesbian, bisexual, or heterosexual (Aaron, Markovic, Danielson, Honnold, Janosky, & Schmidt, 2001; Bloomfield, 1993; Bradford, Ryan, & Rothblum, 1994; Descamps, Rothblum, Bradford, & Ryan, 2000; Diamant, Wold, Spritzer, & Gelberg, 2000; McKirnan & Peterson, 1989a; McKirnan & Peterson, 1989b; Nawyn, Richman, Rospenda, & Hughes, 2000; Skinner & Otis, 1992), while others have classified participants according to the gender of their reported sexual partners (Cochran & Mays, 2000; Dean, Meyer, Robinson, Sell, Sember, Silenzio et al., 2000; Gilman, Cochran, Mays, Hughes, Ostrow, & Kessler, 2001; Hughes, Haas, Razzano, Cassidy, & Matthews, 2000; Marrazzo, Koutsky, & Handsfiel, 2001). Few researchers have assessed both sexual identity and sexual behavior. Moreover, relatively few studies have assessed women’s sexual identity or sexual behavior with other women in representative or population-based samples (Solarz, 1999).

Findings from studies using both sexual identity and sexual behavior have shown that these two dimensions of sexual orientation are not always consistent (Diamant, Schuster, McGuigan, & Lever, 1999; White, 1997). Some women who have sex with other women do not identify as lesbian or bisexual, and women who self-identify as lesbian often report current or past sexual behavior with men. Thus, either approach alone risks the exclusion of important segments of the sexual minority population. Further, because many study samples are small and often homogeneous, researchers commonly aggregate women who identify as bisexual with those who identify as lesbian, or omit bisexual women from the data analyses (Aaron et al., 2001; Bloomfield, 1993; McKirnan & Peterson, 1989a). Similarly, women who report exclusively same-sex behavior may be aggregated with respondents who report sexual activity with both women and men (Cochran & Mays, 2000; Gilman et al.

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