Contents:
- MENTAL HEALTH LBIAN, GAY, BISEXUAL, AND TRANSGENR (LGBT) YOUTH
- MENTAL HEALTH CHALLENG OF LBIAN, GAY, BISEXUAL AND TRANSGENR PEOPLE: AN TEGRATED LERATURE REVIEW
- PREJUDICE, SOCIAL STRS, AND MENTAL HEALTH LBIAN, GAY, AND BISEXUAL POPULATNS: CONCEPTUAL ISSU AND REARCH EVINCE
MENTAL HEALTH LBIAN, GAY, BISEXUAL, AND TRANSGENR (LGBT) YOUTH
Published fal eded form as:PMCID: PMC4887282NIHMSID: NIHMS789458AbstractToday’s lbian, gay, bisexual, and transgenr (LGBT) youth e out at younger ag, and public support for LGBT issu has dramatilly creased, so why do LGBT youth ntue to be at high risk for promised mental health? Yet the first public and rearch attentn to young LGBTs foced explicly on mental health: A small number of studi the 1980s began to intify ncerng rat of reported suicidal behavr among “gay” youth, and a US feral report on “gay youth suici” (Gibson 1989) beme ntroversial both polics and rearch (Rsell 2003).
MENTAL HEALTH CHALLENG OF LBIAN, GAY, BISEXUAL AND TRANSGENR PEOPLE: AN TEGRATED LERATURE REVIEW
2014) sum, chang societal acceptance of LGBT people have ma g out possible for ntemporary youth, yet the age of g out now tersects wh the velopmental perd characterized by potentially tense terpersonal and social regulatn of genr and sexualy, cludg homophobia. We then highlight studi that foc on factors that protect and foster rilience among LGBT to the 1970s, the Amerin Psychiatric Associatn’s (APA’s) Diagnostic and Statistil Manual of Mental Disorrs (DSM) listed homosexualy as a “socpathic personaly disturbance” (Am.
1948, 1953) and psychologil parisons between heterosexual and gay men (Hooker 1957) fostered a change attus om the psychologil muny and motivated the APA’s removal of homosexualy as a mental disorr 1973 (although all ndns related to same-sex attractn were not removed until 1987). Generally, Meyer (2003) poss three strs procs om distal to proximal: (a) objective or external strsors, which clu stctural or stutnalized discrimatn and direct terpersonal teractns of victimizatn or prejudice; (b) one’s expectatns that victimizatn or rejectn will occur and the vigilance related to the expectatns; and (c) the ternalizatn of negative social attus (often referred to as ternalized homophobia).
As a rult, lbian and gay youth livg unti wh fewer sexual orientatn and genr inty (SOGI)-specific antibullyg polici are twice as likely to report past-year suici attempts than youth livg areas where the polici were more monplace (Hatzenbuehler & Key 2013) wh school environments, is also important to nsir youths’ muny ntext. E., those wh more protectns for same-sex upl, greater number of registered Democrats, prence of gay-straight allianc (GSAs) schools, and SOGI-specific nondiscrimatn and antibullyg polici] are ls likely to attempt suici even after ntrollg for other risk ditors, such as a history of physil abe, prsive symptomatology, drkg behavrs, and peer victimizatn (Hatzenbuehler 2011).
PREJUDICE, SOCIAL STRS, AND MENTAL HEALTH LBIAN, GAY, AND BISEXUAL POPULATNS: CONCEPTUAL ISSU AND REARCH EVINCE
Importantly, although rat of bullyg crease over the urse of the adolcent years, this trend is ls pronounced for gay and bisexual pared to heterosexual mal, leavg the youth vulnerable to the experienc for longer perds of time (Robson et al.
Rults om a three-year longudal study showed that parison to LGB youth who dated other-sex partners, those who dated same-sex partners experienced an crease self-teem and a crease ternalized homophobia for men and women, rpectively (Bermeister et al.
At one extreme, the Tennsee legislature failed to pass the “Don’t Say Gay” bill, which would have ma illegal for teachers to discs homosexualy wh stunts; at the other, the “Mental Health Servic for At-Risk Youth” bill California allows youth ag 12 to 17 to nsent to mental health treatment whout parental permissn and was signed to enable LGBT youth to seek mental health servic pennt of parental nsent. For example, a study of 77 gay male llege stunts showed that young gay men’s psychosocial functng (cludg openns wh their sexual orientatn) was improved through exprsive wrg that targeted gay-related strs, pecially for those who reported lower social support or who wrote about more severe topics (Pachankis & Goldied 2010).