Umoya05

Source: American Psychological Association

Same-sex couples are just as committed in their romantic relationships as heterosexual couples, say researchers who have studied the quality of adult relationships and healthy development. Their finding disputes the stereotype that couples in same-sex relationships are not as committed as their heterosexual counterparts and are therefore not as psychologically healthy.

These results are from two studies featured in the January issue of Developmental Psychology, published by the American Psychological Association. This issue includes a special section that examines sexual orientation across the lifespan.

Both studies compared same-sex couples with opposite-sex couples on a number of developmental and relationship factors. The first study examined whether committed same-sex couples differ from engaged and married opposite-sex couples in how well they interacted and how satisfied they were with their partners. Evidence has shown that positive interactions improve the quality of relationships in ways that foster healthy adult development.
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In the second study, researchers from the University of Washington, San Diego State University and the University of Vermont wanted to examine how sexual orientation and legal status affected relationship quality. To do so, they followed 65 male and 138 female same-sex couples with civil unions, 23 male and 61 female same-sex couples not in civil unions and 55 heterosexual married couples over a three-year period. One member of each heterosexual couple was a sibling to a member of a civil union couple.

Both partners in all of the couples answered questions regarding their demographics, status of their relationship, number of children, sexual behavior, frequency of contact with their parents with and without their partners and perceived social support. Partners in same-sex relationships also answered questions regarding disclosure of their sexual orientation to their family, peers and work associates.

The researchers found that same-sex couples were similar to heterosexual couples on most relationships variables, and that the legalized status of a relationship did not seem to be the overriding factor affecting same-sex relationships.

Despite the legal status of their relationships, the civil union couples showed no differences on any of the relationship measures from the same-sex couples who were in committed relationships but not in civil unions.

+ Adult Romantic Relationships as Contexts of Human Development: A Multimethod Comparison of Same-Sex Couples with Opposite-Sex Dating, Engaged, and Married Dyads (PDF; 67 KB)
+ Three-Year Follow-Up of Same-Sex Couples Who Had Civil Unions in Vermont, Same-Sex Couples Not in Civil Unions, and Heterosexual Married Couples (PDF; 81 KB)

Bisexuality Not a Transitional Phase Among Women, According to New Research
Source: American Psychological Association

Bisexuality in women appears to be a distinctive sexual orientation and not an experimental or transitional stage that some women adopt “on their way” to lesbianism, according to new research published by the American Psychological Association.

The study of 79 non-heterosexual women over 10 years found that bisexual women maintained a stable pattern of attraction to both sexes. In addition, the research appears to have debunked the stereotype that bisexual women are uninterested in or unable to commit to long-term monogamous relationships.
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• Bisexual and unlabeled women were more likely than lesbians to change their identity over the course of the study, but they tended to switch between bisexual and unlabeled rather than to settle on lesbian or heterosexual as their identities.
• Seventeen percent of respondents switched from a bisexual or unlabeled identity to heterosexual during the study - but more than half of these women switched back to bisexual or unlabeled by the end.
• By year 10, most of the women were involved in long-term (i.e., more than a year in length) monogamous relationships - 70 percent of the self-identified lesbians, 89 percent of the bisexuals, 85 percent of the unlabeled women and 67 percent of those who were then calling themselves heterosexual.
• Women’s definitions of lesbianism appeared to permit more flexibility in behavior than their definitions of heterosexuality. For example, of the women who identified as lesbian in the last round of interviews, 15 percent reported having sexual contact with a man during the prior two years. In contrast, none of the women who settled on a heterosexual label at that point reported having sexual contact with a woman within the previous two years.

+ Female Bisexuality From Adolescence to Adulthood: Results From a 10-Year Longitudinal Study (PDF; 141 KB)

Ex-Gays? A Longitudinal Study of Religiously Mediated Change in Sexual Orientation (PDF; 385 KB)
Source: American Association of Christian Counselors (via InterVarsity Press)

We report here for the first time the findings of our longitudinal study of religiously mediated sexual orientation change in a sample of men and women involved in a variety of Christian ministries affiliated under the umbrella organization Exodus International. Our findings address directly two of the most contentious and disputed questions of our day: Is change of sexual orientation, particularly change of homosexual orientation, possible at all? And is the attempt to change sexual orientation harmful? We are evangelical Christians committed to the truth-seeking activity of science. In conducting and reporting this study, we took seriously the words of one of our heroes, C. S. Lewis, who said that science produced by Christian persons would have to be “perfectly honest. Science twisted in the interests of apologetics would be sin and folly.” In that spirit, we report here at the start that the funding for this study was provided by Exodus, and that we accepted this funding pledging to Exodus that we would be reporting publicly the results of our outcome study regardless of how encouraging or embarrassing Exodus might find those results.

In this study we found empirical evidence that change of homosexual orientation is possible for some through involvement in Exodus ministries. Success took two forms. One form of success was an embrace of chastity with a reduction in prominence of homosexual desire. These persons regard themselves as having reestablished their sexual identities in some way other than their homosexual attractions. The second form of success was marked by a diminishing of homosexual attraction and an increase in heterosexual attraction, with resulting satisfactory, if not uncomplicated, heterosexual adjustment. These latter individuals regard themselves as having changed their sexual orientation from homosexual to heterosexual. Further, we found little evidence of harm incurred as a result of the involvement of the participants in the Exodus change process.

+ InterVarsity Press website for Ex-Gays? book (with related downloads)