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).
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).
MENTAL HEALTH CHALLENG OF LBIAN, GAY, BISEXUAL AND TRANSGENR PEOPLE: AN TEGRATED LERATURE REVIEW
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). 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.
PREJUDICE, SOCIAL STRS, AND MENTAL HEALTH LBIAN, GAY, AND BISEXUAL POPULATNS: CONCEPTUAL ISSU AND REARCH EVINCE
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). E., substance e)Genr intyone’s sense and subjective experience of genr (malens/femalens), which may or may not be nsistent wh birth sexSexual orientatnendurg sense of emotnal, sexual attractn to others based on their sex/genrSOGIsexual orientatn and genr intyGSAGay-Straight Alliance school clubSexual intyself-label to scribe one’s sexual orientatn, such as lbian, gay, bisexual, or straightCBOmuny-based anizatnFootnotDISCLOSURE STATEMENTThe thors are not aware of any affiliatns, memberships, fundg, or fancial holdgs that might be perceived as affectg the objectivy of this review.
Keywords: LGBT, mental health dispari, discrimatn, stigmatisatn, victimisatnIntroductnThe acronym LGBTQ (also LGBTQAP+, LGBTQA, GLBTIQ, LGBT, LGBTQ and other alternat) is an umbrella term that stands for lbian, gay, bisexual, transgenr, tersex, and queer or qutng people. This acronym has s origs the shorter versn lbian, gay, bisexual and transgenr (LGBT), which vers a heterogeneo group of LGBT people who often feature together as a group efforts to ga better social reprentatn and more polil support (Salmen 2015:11). The LGBT dividuals have unique experienc that are shaped by multiple factors, such as race/ethnicy, soc-enomic stat, geographil lotn and age, not jt sexual orientatn (Farmer & Yancu 2015:37) lbian, gay, bisexual and transgenr people differ om ‘tradnal’ mori two aspects: (1) they are not necsarily regnisable through physil characteristics and (2) they are still perceived many ntexts as actg agast natural procs (Takács 2015:10).
N = 914 subjects who had sexual partners of the same sex the past 12 months, the past 5 years, or sce age 18, reprentative sample of sexual mori om the non-stutnalised English-speakg USA populatn aged 18 and vtigate whether stctural stigma (livg muni wh high levels of anti-gay prejudice) creas the risk of premature mortaly for sexual mori. N = 770 rponnts who self-intified as lbian, gay, bisexual and/or transgenr (91 transgenr and 676 non-transgenr), over the age of 19 asss whether transgenr inty is associated wh an elevated probabily of reported discrimatn, prsn symptoms and suicidal attempts pared wh non-transgenr LGB dividuals.