Has Internalised Homophobia Become A Non Issue? Two Researchers Believe It Has

Internalised homophobia has been one of the most researched topic in the field of LGBT health, with researchers finding that the internalisation of the homophobic views held by some in society tended to correlate with a number of  psychological, behavioural, and medical outcomes such as like depression, substance use, and sexual behaviors that put the individual at risk of STDs and AIDs.

Beginning towards the end of the 1980s, the research done on internalised homophobia was based around a desire to understand how homophobia, and the victimisation linked to it, affected the health and behaviour of the LGBT community. It was then hoped this could be used to help prevent the transmission and spread of HIV. The result of these studies was however not as conducive as many hoped due to inconsistency of results.

Two researchers, Michael Newcomb and Brian Mustanski, Ph.D, however believe they are able to pull some useful information from these studies via a method called meta-analysis. Using this approach they combined findings across 16 studies, that represents nearly 3000 men, and acted to explore the relationships and differences in what these studies revealed.

Bringing the data together in a paper which has been published in the  journal Archives of Sexual Behavior, the researchers report that there is a relationship between internalised homophobia and sexual risk taking, however this relationship was very small, and has dripped in correlation by .02 a year meaning it is likely to be  negligible today.

Leading them to believe that this is down to wider acceptance of gays and lesbians in today’s society, the researchers believe that it is not conducive to continue in trying to find the relationship between internalised homophobia and sexual risk taking in men. It is for this reason that they recommend others focus their efforts elsewhere, something which they are doing with their latest project which looks at the relationship between internalised homophobia and mental health.