A Meta-Analysis of Disparities in Childhood Sexual Abuse, Parental Physical Abuse, and Peer Victimization Among Sexual Minority and Sexual Nonminority Individuals

Findings

2011, Behavioral and community health professor Mark S. Friedman and colleagues conducted a meta-analysis of 37 studies from the United States and Canada examining sexual abuse, physical abuse, and peer victimization in heterosexuals as compared to non-heterosexuals. Their results showed that non-heterosexuals were on average 2.9 times more likely to report having been abused as children (under 18 years of age).

Read more : https://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/10.2105/AJPH.2009.190009

The prevalence of sexual assault against people who identify as Gay, Lesbian or Bisexual in the United States: A systematic review

Findings

This article systematically reviews 75 studies that examine the prevalence of sexual assault victimization among gay or bisexual (GB) men, and lesbian or bisexual (LB) women, in the United States. The authors reviewed the reported prevalence of lifetime sexual assault victimization (LSA), and where available, childhood sexual assault (CSA), adult sexual assault (ASA), intimate partner sexual assault (IPSA), and hate crime-related sexual assault (HC). Examined 75 studies (25 of which used probability sampling) involving a total of 139,635 non heterosexuals. Prevalence estimates of LSA ranged from 15.6–85.0% for LB women, and 11.8–54.0% for GB men. Considering the median estimates derived from the collective set of studies reviewed, LB women were more likely to report CSA, ASA, LSA and IPSA than GB men, whereas GB men were more likely to report HC than LB women. Across all studies, the highest estimates reported were for LSA of LB women (85%), CSA of LB women (76.0%), and CSA of GB men (59.2%). Although the study was limited by not having a heterosexual control group, it showed alarmingly high rates of sexual assault, including childhood sexual assault, for this population.

Read more :https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3118668/

Does Physical Abuse, Sexual Abuse, or Neglect in Childhood Increase the Likelihood of Same-sex Sexual Relationships and Cohabitation? A Prospective 30-year Follow-up

Findings

2010, psychologists Helen Wilson and Cathy S. Widom published a prospective 30-year follow-up study in children who underwent abuse or neglect during childhood between 1961-71 and were "followed up 30years later", along with non-maltreated counterparts. And the data shows a high correlation between childhood sex abuse and later same-sex relationship in "men" (than in women)

Readmore :https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19130206/

The Dubious Assessment of Gay, Lesbian, and Bisexual Adolescents of Add Health.

Findings

Surveys suggest that sexual desire may be fluid for a considerable number of individuals, especially among adolescents as they mature through the early stages of adult development. In this regard, opposite-sex attraction and identity seem to be more stable than same-sex or bisexual attraction and identity. This is suggested by data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (the “Add Health” study discussed earlier). This prospective longitudinal study of a nationally representative sample of U.S. adolescents starting in grades 7 – 12 began during the 1994 – 1995 school year, and followed the cohort into young adulthood, with four follow-up interviews (referred to as Waves I, II, III, IV in the literature). The most recent was in 2007 – 2008, when the sample was aged 24 – 32. Same-sex or both-sex romantic attractions were quite prevalent in the study’s first wave, with rates of approximately 7% for the males and 5% for the females. However, 80% of the adolescent males who had reported same-sex attractions at Wave I later identified themselves as exclusively heterosexual as young adults at Wave IV.

Read More :https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10508-013-0219-5

Emotional Problems among Children with Same-Sex Parents:

Difference by Definition

Findings: Using a representative sample of 207,007 children, including 512 with same-sex parents, from the U.S. National Health Interview Survey, prevalence in the two groups was compared for twelve measures of emotional problems, developmental problems, and affiliated service and treatment usage, with controls for age, sex, and race of child and parent education and income.

Emotional problems were over twice as prevalent for children with same-sex parents than for children with opposite-sex parents.

Risk was elevated in the presence of parent psychological distress, moderated by family instability and unaffected by stigmatization, though these all had significant direct effects on emotional problems.

Read more : https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2500537

New Data On Same Sex Parenting (with Walter Schumm)

Findings: Draws inferences from national datasets in Canada and Utah researching this topic.

Divorce rates are generally high among homosexual couples as opposed to heterosexual couples. But bringing in children complicates the issue further. They found that gay couples are relatively stable till they adopt children. But once they have children, they tend to become less stable, whereas heterosexual couples become more stable with the arrival of children.

Read more :https://player.fm/series/think-biblically-conversations-on-faith-culture/new-data-on-same-sex-parenting-with-walter-schumm

How different are the adult children of parents who have same-sex relationships? Findings from the New Family Structures Study

Findings: Mark Regenerus, 2012 study on same-sex parenting using a large sample of 3000 adults. The New Family Structures Study (NFSS) is a social-science data-collection project that fielded a survey to a large, random sample of American young adults (ages 18–39) who were raised in different types of family arrangements. In this debut article of the NFSS, I compare how the young adult children of a parent who has had a same-sex romantic relationship fare on 40 different social, emotional, and relational outcome variables when compared with six other family-of-origin types. The results reveal numerous, consistent differences, especially between the children of women who have had a lesbian relationship and those with still-married (heterosexual) biological parents. The results are typically robust in multivariate contexts as well, suggesting far greater diversity in lesbian parent household experiences than convenience-sample studies of lesbian families have revealed. The NFSS proves to be an illuminating, versatile dataset that can assist family scholars in understanding the long reach of family structure and transitions.

Read more: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0049089X12000610?via%3Dihub

These studies make it quite clear that the best and the ideal environment for children to grow are to have both male and female parent.

Homosexuality in Animals: An Analysis of Sexual Behavior Theories:

• This review paper analyzed five key theories explained by animal models and three key human-based theories to demonstrate that the present strategy for understanding human homosexual behavior is flawed.

• In a Darwinian view, the fittest organisms are those which can maximize reproductive success by producing the greatest number of viable offspring. From this perspective, opposite-sex mates should be preferred over same-sex sexual partners. Despite this, many species engage in homosexual behaviors which seems to undermine reproduction.

• One goal of the research was to attempt to “normalize” homosexual behavior in humans: if non-human animals engage in SSB (same-sex sexual behaviors (SSBs), it must be a natural behavior and humans should not be criticized for it. Despite the good intentions of this research, the review has demonstrated that this generalization is not scientifically appropriate.

• One major criticism of all human homosexuality studies reviewed here is their explicit focus on males. In fact, an extreme majority of human homosexuality studies focus only on males’ behavior.

Resources:

Homosexuality in Animals: An Analysis of Sexual Behavior Theories: https://www.lakeforest.edu/news/homosexuality-in-animals-an-analysis-of-sexual-behavior-theories