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- Title
Willingness to Remain Friends and Attend School with Lesbian and Gay Peers: Relational Expressions of Prejudice Among Heterosexual Youth.
- Authors
Poteat, V. Paul; Espelage, Dorothy L.; Koenig, Brian W.
- Abstract
In this study, heterosexual students’ willingness to remain friends with peers who disclose that they are gay or lesbian and their willingness to attend schools that include gay and lesbian students were examined among two large middle school and high school samples (Sample 1: n = 20,509; 50.7% girls; Sample 2: n = 16,917; 50.2% girls). Boys were less willing than girls to remain friends or attend schools with gay and lesbian peers, as were students in earlier grades than were students in later grades. Further, there was small, yet significant, variability in these scores across schools. Greater racial diversity within the school partially accounted for this school-level variability; students in more racially diverse schools reported greater willingness to remain friends and attend school with gay and lesbian peers. Findings suggest that while intervention programs must continue to address blatant and overt physical aggression against sexual minority youth, there is also a significant need for programming to address the more subtle expressions of sexual prejudice that contribute to unwelcoming and unsafe school climates.
- Subjects
HETEROSEXUALS; HETEROSEXUAL identity; HETEROSEXUALITY; PEER relations; HOMOPHOBIA in high schools; GAY students; LESBIAN students; OUTING (Sexual orientation); COMING out (Sexual orientation); RACE discrimination; PREJUDICES
- Publication
Journal of Youth & Adolescence, 2009, Vol 38, Issue 7, p952
- ISSN
0047-2891
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1007/s10964-009-9416-x