Jan 15, 2009
History 1450-1789: Homosexuality
From: History 1450-1789
Encyclopedia of the Early Modern World, by the Gale Group, Inc.Self-Perceptions
By the late eighteenth century, sodomites in northwestern Europe had not only developed a distinctive societal role, but also perceived themselves as a separate category from men and women. They also talked about these issues among one another. Early in the eighteenth century they would refer to other sodomites as men who liked to do this kind of thing as well. Some seventy years later sodomites talked about "being a member of the family," "people like us," and "you and me and thousands like us." It especially allowed devout men to look upon themselves as morally responsible human beings. From the 1750s onward sodomites arrested in the Dutch Republic would refer to the biblical story of David and Jonathan, and increasingly they would claim to have been born with their inclinations intact. More than half a century before Karl Heinrich Ulrichs in Germany in the 1860s formulated the theory of the existence of a third sex—men born with a female soul—sodomites in the Netherlands spoke among one another of their "condition" or "way of being" as an inborn weakness. There is no documentation about women who clearly spoke in such a way of themselves. For men, one might say this newfound homosexual identity culminated in the contents of a love letter from one Dutch male servant to his male lover early in the nineteenth century. He used still-current terms for boyfriend, talked about "being of the family," and he called upon innate weaknesses to explain their desires, while also legitimizing those desires by telling his lover that God had not created any human being for its own damnation.
Jan 10, 2009
how man 2 man desires were stigmatized by associating them artificially with a queer like Oscar Wilde
Excerpt from: Queer Masculinity: The Representation of John Paul Pitoc’s Body in Trick
However, as Sinfield argues, it was not until the Oscar Wilde trial that the modern day conflation of effeminacy with same sex passion solidified. (5 Alan Sinfield, The Wilde Century (London, Cassell, 1994).
Homophobia = effeminophobia
Excerpt from: Queer Masculinity: The Representation of John Paul Pitoc’s Body in Trick
Effeminacy and Passive sex define the modern homosexual identity as well
Excerpts from the book: Listening to the Sirens: Musical Technologies of Queer Identity from Homer to Hedwig
By Judith Ann Peraino, Published by University of California Press, 2006
page 187
Passive roles
Excerpts from the book, "A critique of social constructionism and Post modern Queer thoery by Rictor Norton":
But the fact of the matter is that a great many indigenous societies didhave words for ‘the homosexual’. By this I mean that they had words which identified a homosexual personality type, not matching the sexological psychopathological personality disorder (which, baldly stated thus, undoubtedly is a modern social construct), but words roughly equivalent to modern queers – words which demonstrate a consciousness (albeit often contemptuous) of a queer stereotype or gay identity. Here are just a few words for queers from many hundreds: in the Middle East the xanitha plays the receptive role with older or richer men; in Nicaragua el cochon; in Italy the arruso and ricchione, andfemmenella, little female, for the transvestite; Loca and maricón in Latin America; the teresita in Argentina; bicha and veado in Brazil; masisi in Haiti; zamel in North Africa. In many languages the generic term for a male homosexual is derived from a female name: Spanish maricón andmariquita derive from María; Italian checca derives from Francesca; Flemish janet derives from French Jeannette; a Portuguese queer is anAdelaida; in England queer men have called themselves Marys, Mary-Annes, mollies, nancy boys, nellies.
Most – but not all – of these labels are derogatory stigma applied to the fucked rather than the fucker. This is also true of most modern non-scientific words for homosexuals.
PASSIVE ROLES
Excerpts from the book, "A critique of social constructionism and Post modern Queer thoery by Rictor Norton":
Passive roles
Excerpts from the book, "A critique of social constructionism and Post modern Queer thoery by Rictor Norton"
The following sentence runs as a leitmotif throughout Greenberg’s The Construction of Homosexuality (1990): ‘Though there was neither word for, nor a concept of, a homosexual person, an adult man who took pleasure in the anal-receptive role was scorned and thought to require an explanation.’
... their concept of the homosexual was primarily limited to the receiver – in exactly the same way that most modern words for homosexuals have that connotation: queer, fairy, pansy, faggot, cocksucker, gay, queen and homo.
Many social constructionists maintain that in ancient Rome, for example, homosexuality in itself was not a problem, but that the problem (i.e. an issue given great consideration) concerned taking the ‘passive’ role in male–male sexual relations (i.e. being penetrated). Thus, for example, there is no term for the active (i.e. penetrating) partner in this relationship; he is simply a man, whereas his passive partner is a catamitus.
Most periods and most cultures have words for homosexuals, but the significance of these is dismissed by noting that the stigmatizing label is almost invariably applied only to the man who takes the passive role, and the passive role is determined by an act rather than orientation or object choice.
...premodern and indigenous cultures have no word for the more abstract concept of the homosexual, but only a word for the effeminate/passive male...
NOTE from Reclaiming Natural Manhood:
Thus it seems that if at all there has been a concept of sexual orientation in the past, then it was that of sexual orientation for passive sex, and sexual orientation for penetrator role... and that the former was 'gay', while the latter was 'straight'. This is essentially what the society at large still believes in, about the concepts of 'homosexuals' and straight. Homosexuality is widely believed to be both about 'transgenderism' and about a desire to be 'penetrated' like a woman.
The following sentence runs as a leitmotif throughout Greenberg’s The Construction of Homosexuality (1990): ‘Though there was neither word for, nor a concept of, a homosexual person, an adult man who took pleasure in the anal-receptive role was scorned and thought to require an explanation.’
... their concept of the homosexual was primarily limited to the receiver – in exactly the same way that most modern words for homosexuals have that connotation: queer, fairy, pansy, faggot, cocksucker, gay, queen and homo.
Many social constructionists maintain that in ancient Rome, for example, homosexuality in itself was not a problem, but that the problem (i.e. an issue given great consideration) concerned taking the ‘passive’ role in male–male sexual relations (i.e. being penetrated). Thus, for example, there is no term for the active (i.e. penetrating) partner in this relationship; he is simply a man, whereas his passive partner is a catamitus.
Most periods and most cultures have words for homosexuals, but the significance of these is dismissed by noting that the stigmatizing label is almost invariably applied only to the man who takes the passive role, and the passive role is determined by an act rather than orientation or object choice.
...premodern and indigenous cultures have no word for the more abstract concept of the homosexual, but only a word for the effeminate/passive male...
NOTE from Reclaiming Natural Manhood:
Thus it seems that if at all there has been a concept of sexual orientation in the past, then it was that of sexual orientation for passive sex, and sexual orientation for penetrator role... and that the former was 'gay', while the latter was 'straight'. This is essentially what the society at large still believes in, about the concepts of 'homosexuals' and straight. Homosexuality is widely believed to be both about 'transgenderism' and about a desire to be 'penetrated' like a woman.
Passive roles
Excerpts from the book, "A critique of social constructionism and Post modern Queer thoery by Rictor Norton":
Greenberg’s (1990) commentary on the temple inscriptions at Edfu, in Memphis, which say that it is forbidden ‘to couple with a nkk or hmw’:
The latter terms, though probably not exact synonyms, have been taken to refer to someone who acts as a receptive male homosexual. Elsewhere, the word hmw means coward; since it is derived from the word for ‘woman,’ it might better be translated as an ‘effeminate poltroon.’ It would be difficult to say whether this was a term of opprobrium applied stereotypically to anyone who preferred a receptive role in homosexual anal intercourse, or only to a distinct, socially recognized homosexual role. . . . As far as we can tell, homosexuality per se was not a category in Egyptian thought. There was no distinctive word for a homosexual person, only composite terms suggesting that gender was the critical category. . . . The negative confessions and temple inscriptions refer to acts, not inclinations or states of being.
The Gay-Straight Divide
by Richard A. Lippa on April 7, 2008
Recently I asked my introductory psychology students, “Do you think that gay men, on average, have different personality traits than heterosexual men? And do you think that lesbian women, on average, have different personality traits than heterosexual women?” Many of my students nodded emphatically, so I probed further and asked, “How do you think gay men differ from heterosexual men in personality? And how do you think lesbians differ from heterosexual women in personality?” Hands flew up and my students told me, in essence, that gay men are more feminine than heterosexual men and that lesbians are more masculine than heterosexual women. My students are not alone in their beliefs. Stereotypes that gay men are more feminine and lesbians more masculine than same-sex heterosexuals are common, according to many studies.
But are such stereotypes true? Recent research I have conducted suggests that there are on-average homosexual-heterosexual differences in personality. However, these differences are considerably larger for some personality traits than for others. To the extent that gay men differ from straight men in personality, they tend to be shifted in the “female” direction, and to the extent that lesbian women differ from straight women, they tend to be shifted in the “male” direction. To understand these findings more fully, it helps to know a bit more about the measurement of personality traits in general and of masculinity-femininity in particular.
According to many contemporary psychologists, there are five main traits that describe human personality, the so-called “Big Five”: extraversion, conscientiousness, agreeableness, neuroticism, and openness to experience. The first three of these traits are pretty well described by their labels. The last two may require a bit more explanation, though. Neuroticism refers to negative emotionality. People who are high on neuroticism tend to be anxious, worried, depressed, and they possess low self-esteem. Openness to experience refers to being open-minded versus closed-minded. People who are high on this trait tend to be liberal and seek out new emotional, intellectual, and aesthetic experiences, whereas people low on openness are more conservative and set in their ways. One question addressed by my research is: Do men and women and do heterosexual and homosexual individuals differ on the Big Five traits?
A second question is: Do men and women differ and do heterosexual and homosexual individuals differ on measures of masculinity and femininity as well as on the Big Five traits? In my research I often focus on three traits measures of masculinity and femininity: instrumentality (sometimes called “agency”), expressiveness (sometimes called “communality”), and gender-related interests. Instrumentality comprises traits such as independence, assertiveness, and leadership ability. Because it’s stereotypically associated more with men than with women, instrumentality is viewed by some researchers to be a measure of masculinity. Expressiveness comprises traits such as warmth, nurturance, and tenderness. Because it’s associated more with women than with men, expressiveness is viewed by some researchers to be a measure of femininity. Finally, gender-related interests comprise male-typical versus female-typical occupational preferences (Are you interested in being an electrical engineer? Are you interested in being a nurse?) and hobby preferences (Do you like to work on cars? Do you like to go clothes shopping?).
A final, obvious way to measure people’s masculinity-femininity is to ask them point blank how masculine and feminine they are. In my research I often ask participants to use rating scales to answer questions such as: “How masculine (feminine) is your personality?” “How masculine (feminine) do you act, appear, and come across to others?” “In general, how masculine (feminine) do you feel you are?” When combined into a single score (add all the “masculine” items and subtract all the “feminine” items), such questions assess what I call self-ascribed masculinity-femininity (M-F)—a person’s conscious self-concept of how masculine-feminine he or she is.
I’ve described nine personality traits so far—The Big Five (extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism, openness) and four measures of masculinity and femininity (instrumentality, expressiveness, gender-related interests, and self-ascribed M-F). Do men and women differ on these traits? Yes, but as I said earlier, gender differences are much stronger for some of these traits than for others. Do gay and lesbian individuals differ from same-sex heterosexuals on these traits? Yes. But once again, the differences are much stronger for some traits than for others. (Can you guess which of the nine listed traits show the biggest gay/lesbian-straight differences?) And finally, do homosexual-heterosexual differences in personality tend to mirror gender differences in personality? Yes, to a large extent they do.
Let me be more concrete about this. In a chapter to appear in the upcoming Annual Review of Sex Research I combined the results of eight studies I conducted over the past decade that assessed personality traits in a total of 2,724 heterosexual men, 799 gay men, 5,053 heterosexual women, and 697 lesbian women. My results are summarized in Table 1. Gender differences and sexual orientation differences in personality are expressed in terms of “effect sizes” (a kind of standardized unit). In psychology, effect sizes 0.2, 0.5, and 0.8 are considered to be “small,” “medium,” and “large,” respectively. The signs don’t matter when assessing magnitude—a positive number simply means the first group is higher than the second, whereas a negative number means the second group is higher than the first.
Table 1. Effect Sizes for Gender Differences and Heterosexual-Homosexual Differences in Personality
Personality Trait Heterosexual Male-Female Differences Heterosexual-Gay Male Differences Heterosexual-Lesbian Female Differences
Extraversion -.19 -.08 .04
Agreeableness -.21 -.22 -.01
Conscientiousness -.17 -.30 .05
Neuroticism -.48 -.20 .30
Openness .20 -.42 -.47
Instrumentality .22 .04 -.27
Expressiveness -.49 -.37 .04
Masculinity-Femininity of Interests 2.65 1.28 -1.46
Self-Ascribed Masculinity-Femininity 2.83 .60 -1.28
Here’s a brief summary of the key findings. There were significant (i.e., non-chance) gender differences in personality, but many of these differences were small to moderate in magnitude. Women tended to be higher than men on extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism, and expressiveness, whereas men tended to be higher than women on openness and instrumentality. Very large male-female differences were present for M-F of interests and self-ascribed M-F.
Gay men were somewhat higher than straight men on agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism, openness, and expressiveness. Except for openness to experience, gay-straight male differences mirrored male-female differences—that is, traits that gay men scored higher on than straight men were also traits that women scored higher on than men, and vice versa. The really big gay-straight male difference was for M-F of interests. Gay men had much more feminine occupational and hobby preferences than heterosexual men did. To give you a sense of the magnitude of this difference, the effect size listed in Table 1 implies that 90% of gay men have interests that are more feminine than the average straight man’s. Interestingly, the gay-straight male difference in self-ascribed M-F was more modest, and I suspect this is due to the fact that many gay men (like many straight men) don’t like to openly rate themselves as being “feminine.”
What were the corresponding results for women? Lesbian women were somewhat higher on openness and instrumentality than straight women were, and they were somewhat lower on neuroticism. As was true for the corresponding results for men, lesbian-straight female differences mirrored male-female differences—that is, traits that lesbians scored higher on than straight women were also traits that men scored higher on than women, and vice versa. The really big lesbian-straight female differences were for M-F of interests and self-ascribed M-F. Lesbian women had much more masculine occupational and hobby preferences than heterosexual women did. The effect size for this difference implies that 93% of lesbian women had interests that were more masculine than the average straight woman’s. Furthermore, lesbians rated themselves to be considerably more masculine and less feminine than straight women did. Thus, lesbians seemed to openly acknowledge and embrace their masculinity more than gay men acknowledged and embraced their femininity.
I should note that there were some limitations to the studies summarized in Table 1. First of all, most of the participants were from California. An old Fred Allen line asserts that “when the nation tilts, all the nuts roll to California,” so perhaps my results were based on somewhat nutty California samples. In addition, most of my heterosexual participants were college students, and many of my gay and lesbian participants were volunteers recruited at southern California gay pride festivals. Clearly, these are not random samples. College students may differ from “real people” in many ways, and gays and lesbians who attend gay pride festivals may differ substantially from broader populations of gays and lesbians.
Because of the limitations of my California studies, I was excited recently to have the opportunity to analyze new data from a huge Internet survey conducted by the BBC early in 2005 (the survey results were intended for use in a BBC documentary entitled The Secrets of the Sexes). Included in the BBC survey were a number of personality items that assessed participants on extraversion, agreeableness, neuroticism, assertiveness (a proxy for instrumentality), M-F of occupational preferences, and self-ascribed M-F. Participants also reported their sexual orientation. The BBC survey collected data from about a quarter of a million people from various countries, including over 6,000 gay men and close to 3,000 lesbians.
In general the BBC survey results strongly replicated the findings of my California studies. Gay men were somewhat higher than straight men on agreeableness and neuroticism, whereas straight men were a bit higher than gay men on assertiveness. Gay and straight men differed moderately on self-ascribed M-F, with gay men rating themselves to be more feminine and less masculine than straight men. Finally, gay men and straight men differed strongly on the M-F of their occupational preferences (effect size = 1.12). As in the California studies, to the extent that gay men differed from straight men in personality, they were shifted in the “female” direction, and this shift was particularly large for M-F assessed from occupational preferences.
The BBC results for lesbian-straight female differences were also consistent with my California studies. Lesbians were a bit lower than straight women on extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism, and they were a bit higher than straight women on assertiveness. Again, the really big differences were for M-F based on occupational preferences (effect size = -.87) and for self-ascribed M-F (effect size = -.75). To the extent that lesbians differed from straight women in personality, they tended to be shifted in the “male” direction, and this shift was particularly large for the M-F assessed from occupational preferences and for self-ascribed M-F.
Why are there on-average homosexual-heterosexual differences in personality?
Furthermore, why do these differences tend to mirror gender differences in personality? One possibility is that there are biological factors (e.g., prenatal exposure to sex hormones) that cause both gender differences and sexual orientation differences in personality. This “essentialist” position holds that there are some innate personality differences between men and women and also between heterosexual and homosexual individuals, and the underlying factors that cause these two kinds of differences overlap. Other possibilities include various social-environmental explanations for homosexual-heterosexual differences in personality. For example, perhaps powerful gender and sexual orientation stereotypes mold individuals’ self-concepts and their gender-related traits and behaviors. In addition, subcultural norms, roles, and pressures may lead to different traits in heterosexual men, heterosexual women, gay men, and lesbian women. For example, macho peer norms often lead many teenage boys in our society to behave in very masculine ways, whereas gay and lesbian subcultures sometimes push their members to experiment with gender-bending roles that depart from normative masculinity and femininity (e.g., the campy gay man, the “bull dyke”).
I suspect that ongoing research will demonstrate the existence of both biological and social-environment factors that lead to heterosexual-homosexual differences in personality. Some of the small-to-moderate sexual orientation differences in personality documented in Table 1 may very well result from social roles, social stereotypes, and subcultural norms. For example, if you look at Table 1 you’ll see that both gay men and lesbian women tended to be moderately higher than same-sex heterosexuals on openness to experience. My preferred explanation for this is that gay and lesbian individuals’ norm-breaking, marginalized, culture-straddling life experiences lead them, in some ways, to be more iconoclastic, cognitively flexible, liberal, and self-aware than heterosexuals are (i.e., I’m offering a social role explanation here).
However, I believe that the differences in gender-related interests I’ve observed in gay versus straight men and in lesbian versus straight women are so large and so consistent across groups, nations, and cultures that they likely result, at least in part, from biological factors that influence the sexual development of the brain. Such factors may include genes, prenatal hormones, biologically active environmental factors (e.g., maternal stress during pregnancy, prenatal exposure to chemicals and infectious agents, maternal immune factors), and “developmental instability,” which is jargon for noisy variations in biological development that occur in all organisms.
What are the social and political implications of my findings? Some advocates of gay and lesbian rights have asserted that an individual’s sexual orientation is something the individual is “born with,” and as such, one’s sexual orientation should be a status that is protected by civil rights and anti-discrimination legislation. Social science research documents the persuasiveness of this argument when it shows that people who believe sexual orientation to be innate are in fact more tolerant of gay and lesbian individuals and supportive of civil rights for sexual minorities. Thus, to the extent that my research adds to a growing body of evidence that there probably are biological factors that influence sexual orientation (and its associated traits), it bolsters such arguments for civil rights for sexual minorities. (For what it’s worth, I believe that sexual minorities’ civil rights should be protected regardless of whether sexual orientation is inborn, environmentally caused, or “chosen.”)
To the extent that my research suggests that there are “essential” traits associated both with gender and with sexual orientation, it may go against the grain of many contemporary gender scholars, who contend that gender and sexual orientation are “socially constructed” and therefore highly fluid. In the past, some defenders of gay rights have argued that gay and lesbian people are “just like heterosexuals” except for one thing—the sex of the people they love. My research suggests that this is not true. Gay and lesbian individuals differ, on average, from same-sex heterosexuals in a number of ways other than the sex of the people they are romantically and sexually attracted to. Figuring out why these differences occur will occupy the attention of social scientists for years to come.
A final comment: It is easy to cast research on personality differences between homosexual and heterosexual individuals as research on “gay traits” and “lesbian traits.” However, I believe this is a mistake. My research is as much about heterosexual traits as it is about gay and lesbian traits, and it is as much about gender as it is about sexual orientation. My studies show that there are complex and sometimes strong links between gender differences in personality and sexual orientation differences in personality. Untangling the reasons for these links will not only provide new information about the nature of sexual orientation, but it will also help inform us about the nature of sex and gender—a topic that is important to each and every one of us.
Richard Lippa is a professor of psychology at California State University, Fullerton. The author of many research articles on gender, masculinity, and femininity, Lippa was a National Science Foundation Graduate Fellow at Stanford University, where he received his Ph.D. in psychology. Lippa also served as a research consultant to the 2005 BBC documentary Secrets of the Sexes, and helped develop the 2005 BBC Internet survey on gender and sex differences.
Recently I asked my introductory psychology students, “Do you think that gay men, on average, have different personality traits than heterosexual men? And do you think that lesbian women, on average, have different personality traits than heterosexual women?” Many of my students nodded emphatically, so I probed further and asked, “How do you think gay men differ from heterosexual men in personality? And how do you think lesbians differ from heterosexual women in personality?” Hands flew up and my students told me, in essence, that gay men are more feminine than heterosexual men and that lesbians are more masculine than heterosexual women. My students are not alone in their beliefs. Stereotypes that gay men are more feminine and lesbians more masculine than same-sex heterosexuals are common, according to many studies.
But are such stereotypes true? Recent research I have conducted suggests that there are on-average homosexual-heterosexual differences in personality. However, these differences are considerably larger for some personality traits than for others. To the extent that gay men differ from straight men in personality, they tend to be shifted in the “female” direction, and to the extent that lesbian women differ from straight women, they tend to be shifted in the “male” direction. To understand these findings more fully, it helps to know a bit more about the measurement of personality traits in general and of masculinity-femininity in particular.
According to many contemporary psychologists, there are five main traits that describe human personality, the so-called “Big Five”: extraversion, conscientiousness, agreeableness, neuroticism, and openness to experience. The first three of these traits are pretty well described by their labels. The last two may require a bit more explanation, though. Neuroticism refers to negative emotionality. People who are high on neuroticism tend to be anxious, worried, depressed, and they possess low self-esteem. Openness to experience refers to being open-minded versus closed-minded. People who are high on this trait tend to be liberal and seek out new emotional, intellectual, and aesthetic experiences, whereas people low on openness are more conservative and set in their ways. One question addressed by my research is: Do men and women and do heterosexual and homosexual individuals differ on the Big Five traits?
A second question is: Do men and women differ and do heterosexual and homosexual individuals differ on measures of masculinity and femininity as well as on the Big Five traits? In my research I often focus on three traits measures of masculinity and femininity: instrumentality (sometimes called “agency”), expressiveness (sometimes called “communality”), and gender-related interests. Instrumentality comprises traits such as independence, assertiveness, and leadership ability. Because it’s stereotypically associated more with men than with women, instrumentality is viewed by some researchers to be a measure of masculinity. Expressiveness comprises traits such as warmth, nurturance, and tenderness. Because it’s associated more with women than with men, expressiveness is viewed by some researchers to be a measure of femininity. Finally, gender-related interests comprise male-typical versus female-typical occupational preferences (Are you interested in being an electrical engineer? Are you interested in being a nurse?) and hobby preferences (Do you like to work on cars? Do you like to go clothes shopping?).
A final, obvious way to measure people’s masculinity-femininity is to ask them point blank how masculine and feminine they are. In my research I often ask participants to use rating scales to answer questions such as: “How masculine (feminine) is your personality?” “How masculine (feminine) do you act, appear, and come across to others?” “In general, how masculine (feminine) do you feel you are?” When combined into a single score (add all the “masculine” items and subtract all the “feminine” items), such questions assess what I call self-ascribed masculinity-femininity (M-F)—a person’s conscious self-concept of how masculine-feminine he or she is.
I’ve described nine personality traits so far—The Big Five (extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism, openness) and four measures of masculinity and femininity (instrumentality, expressiveness, gender-related interests, and self-ascribed M-F). Do men and women differ on these traits? Yes, but as I said earlier, gender differences are much stronger for some of these traits than for others. Do gay and lesbian individuals differ from same-sex heterosexuals on these traits? Yes. But once again, the differences are much stronger for some traits than for others. (Can you guess which of the nine listed traits show the biggest gay/lesbian-straight differences?) And finally, do homosexual-heterosexual differences in personality tend to mirror gender differences in personality? Yes, to a large extent they do.
Let me be more concrete about this. In a chapter to appear in the upcoming Annual Review of Sex Research I combined the results of eight studies I conducted over the past decade that assessed personality traits in a total of 2,724 heterosexual men, 799 gay men, 5,053 heterosexual women, and 697 lesbian women. My results are summarized in Table 1. Gender differences and sexual orientation differences in personality are expressed in terms of “effect sizes” (a kind of standardized unit). In psychology, effect sizes 0.2, 0.5, and 0.8 are considered to be “small,” “medium,” and “large,” respectively. The signs don’t matter when assessing magnitude—a positive number simply means the first group is higher than the second, whereas a negative number means the second group is higher than the first.
Table 1. Effect Sizes for Gender Differences and Heterosexual-Homosexual Differences in Personality
Personality Trait Heterosexual Male-Female Differences Heterosexual-Gay Male Differences Heterosexual-Lesbian Female Differences
Extraversion -.19 -.08 .04
Agreeableness -.21 -.22 -.01
Conscientiousness -.17 -.30 .05
Neuroticism -.48 -.20 .30
Openness .20 -.42 -.47
Instrumentality .22 .04 -.27
Expressiveness -.49 -.37 .04
Masculinity-Femininity of Interests 2.65 1.28 -1.46
Self-Ascribed Masculinity-Femininity 2.83 .60 -1.28
Here’s a brief summary of the key findings. There were significant (i.e., non-chance) gender differences in personality, but many of these differences were small to moderate in magnitude. Women tended to be higher than men on extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism, and expressiveness, whereas men tended to be higher than women on openness and instrumentality. Very large male-female differences were present for M-F of interests and self-ascribed M-F.
Gay men were somewhat higher than straight men on agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism, openness, and expressiveness. Except for openness to experience, gay-straight male differences mirrored male-female differences—that is, traits that gay men scored higher on than straight men were also traits that women scored higher on than men, and vice versa. The really big gay-straight male difference was for M-F of interests. Gay men had much more feminine occupational and hobby preferences than heterosexual men did. To give you a sense of the magnitude of this difference, the effect size listed in Table 1 implies that 90% of gay men have interests that are more feminine than the average straight man’s. Interestingly, the gay-straight male difference in self-ascribed M-F was more modest, and I suspect this is due to the fact that many gay men (like many straight men) don’t like to openly rate themselves as being “feminine.”
What were the corresponding results for women? Lesbian women were somewhat higher on openness and instrumentality than straight women were, and they were somewhat lower on neuroticism. As was true for the corresponding results for men, lesbian-straight female differences mirrored male-female differences—that is, traits that lesbians scored higher on than straight women were also traits that men scored higher on than women, and vice versa. The really big lesbian-straight female differences were for M-F of interests and self-ascribed M-F. Lesbian women had much more masculine occupational and hobby preferences than heterosexual women did. The effect size for this difference implies that 93% of lesbian women had interests that were more masculine than the average straight woman’s. Furthermore, lesbians rated themselves to be considerably more masculine and less feminine than straight women did. Thus, lesbians seemed to openly acknowledge and embrace their masculinity more than gay men acknowledged and embraced their femininity.
I should note that there were some limitations to the studies summarized in Table 1. First of all, most of the participants were from California. An old Fred Allen line asserts that “when the nation tilts, all the nuts roll to California,” so perhaps my results were based on somewhat nutty California samples. In addition, most of my heterosexual participants were college students, and many of my gay and lesbian participants were volunteers recruited at southern California gay pride festivals. Clearly, these are not random samples. College students may differ from “real people” in many ways, and gays and lesbians who attend gay pride festivals may differ substantially from broader populations of gays and lesbians.
Because of the limitations of my California studies, I was excited recently to have the opportunity to analyze new data from a huge Internet survey conducted by the BBC early in 2005 (the survey results were intended for use in a BBC documentary entitled The Secrets of the Sexes). Included in the BBC survey were a number of personality items that assessed participants on extraversion, agreeableness, neuroticism, assertiveness (a proxy for instrumentality), M-F of occupational preferences, and self-ascribed M-F. Participants also reported their sexual orientation. The BBC survey collected data from about a quarter of a million people from various countries, including over 6,000 gay men and close to 3,000 lesbians.
In general the BBC survey results strongly replicated the findings of my California studies. Gay men were somewhat higher than straight men on agreeableness and neuroticism, whereas straight men were a bit higher than gay men on assertiveness. Gay and straight men differed moderately on self-ascribed M-F, with gay men rating themselves to be more feminine and less masculine than straight men. Finally, gay men and straight men differed strongly on the M-F of their occupational preferences (effect size = 1.12). As in the California studies, to the extent that gay men differed from straight men in personality, they were shifted in the “female” direction, and this shift was particularly large for M-F assessed from occupational preferences.
The BBC results for lesbian-straight female differences were also consistent with my California studies. Lesbians were a bit lower than straight women on extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism, and they were a bit higher than straight women on assertiveness. Again, the really big differences were for M-F based on occupational preferences (effect size = -.87) and for self-ascribed M-F (effect size = -.75). To the extent that lesbians differed from straight women in personality, they tended to be shifted in the “male” direction, and this shift was particularly large for the M-F assessed from occupational preferences and for self-ascribed M-F.
Why are there on-average homosexual-heterosexual differences in personality?
Furthermore, why do these differences tend to mirror gender differences in personality? One possibility is that there are biological factors (e.g., prenatal exposure to sex hormones) that cause both gender differences and sexual orientation differences in personality. This “essentialist” position holds that there are some innate personality differences between men and women and also between heterosexual and homosexual individuals, and the underlying factors that cause these two kinds of differences overlap. Other possibilities include various social-environmental explanations for homosexual-heterosexual differences in personality. For example, perhaps powerful gender and sexual orientation stereotypes mold individuals’ self-concepts and their gender-related traits and behaviors. In addition, subcultural norms, roles, and pressures may lead to different traits in heterosexual men, heterosexual women, gay men, and lesbian women. For example, macho peer norms often lead many teenage boys in our society to behave in very masculine ways, whereas gay and lesbian subcultures sometimes push their members to experiment with gender-bending roles that depart from normative masculinity and femininity (e.g., the campy gay man, the “bull dyke”).
I suspect that ongoing research will demonstrate the existence of both biological and social-environment factors that lead to heterosexual-homosexual differences in personality. Some of the small-to-moderate sexual orientation differences in personality documented in Table 1 may very well result from social roles, social stereotypes, and subcultural norms. For example, if you look at Table 1 you’ll see that both gay men and lesbian women tended to be moderately higher than same-sex heterosexuals on openness to experience. My preferred explanation for this is that gay and lesbian individuals’ norm-breaking, marginalized, culture-straddling life experiences lead them, in some ways, to be more iconoclastic, cognitively flexible, liberal, and self-aware than heterosexuals are (i.e., I’m offering a social role explanation here).
However, I believe that the differences in gender-related interests I’ve observed in gay versus straight men and in lesbian versus straight women are so large and so consistent across groups, nations, and cultures that they likely result, at least in part, from biological factors that influence the sexual development of the brain. Such factors may include genes, prenatal hormones, biologically active environmental factors (e.g., maternal stress during pregnancy, prenatal exposure to chemicals and infectious agents, maternal immune factors), and “developmental instability,” which is jargon for noisy variations in biological development that occur in all organisms.
What are the social and political implications of my findings? Some advocates of gay and lesbian rights have asserted that an individual’s sexual orientation is something the individual is “born with,” and as such, one’s sexual orientation should be a status that is protected by civil rights and anti-discrimination legislation. Social science research documents the persuasiveness of this argument when it shows that people who believe sexual orientation to be innate are in fact more tolerant of gay and lesbian individuals and supportive of civil rights for sexual minorities. Thus, to the extent that my research adds to a growing body of evidence that there probably are biological factors that influence sexual orientation (and its associated traits), it bolsters such arguments for civil rights for sexual minorities. (For what it’s worth, I believe that sexual minorities’ civil rights should be protected regardless of whether sexual orientation is inborn, environmentally caused, or “chosen.”)
To the extent that my research suggests that there are “essential” traits associated both with gender and with sexual orientation, it may go against the grain of many contemporary gender scholars, who contend that gender and sexual orientation are “socially constructed” and therefore highly fluid. In the past, some defenders of gay rights have argued that gay and lesbian people are “just like heterosexuals” except for one thing—the sex of the people they love. My research suggests that this is not true. Gay and lesbian individuals differ, on average, from same-sex heterosexuals in a number of ways other than the sex of the people they are romantically and sexually attracted to. Figuring out why these differences occur will occupy the attention of social scientists for years to come.
A final comment: It is easy to cast research on personality differences between homosexual and heterosexual individuals as research on “gay traits” and “lesbian traits.” However, I believe this is a mistake. My research is as much about heterosexual traits as it is about gay and lesbian traits, and it is as much about gender as it is about sexual orientation. My studies show that there are complex and sometimes strong links between gender differences in personality and sexual orientation differences in personality. Untangling the reasons for these links will not only provide new information about the nature of sexual orientation, but it will also help inform us about the nature of sex and gender—a topic that is important to each and every one of us.
Richard Lippa is a professor of psychology at California State University, Fullerton. The author of many research articles on gender, masculinity, and femininity, Lippa was a National Science Foundation Graduate Fellow at Stanford University, where he received his Ph.D. in psychology. Lippa also served as a research consultant to the 2005 BBC documentary Secrets of the Sexes, and helped develop the 2005 BBC Internet survey on gender and sex differences.
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