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Gender-Related Traits of Heterosexual and Homosexual Men and Women

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Abstract

Two studies investigated the relation between sexual orientation and gender-related traits. Analyzing data from an Internet survey, Study 1 found that gay men and lesbians differed from same-sex heterosexuals most strongly on gender diagnosticity (GD) measures, which assess male- versus female-typicality of occupational preferences (effect sizes were 1.14 for men and 0.53 for women) and least strongly on instrumentality (I) and expressiveness (E). Study 2 found that GD measures showed large differences between 289 gay and 200 heterosexual men (d = 0.95) and between 296 lesbian and 435 heterosexual women (d = 1.32), whereas I and E showed much smaller differences. In Study 2 homosexual–heterosexual diagnosticity measures, computed from men's and women's occupational preferences, correlated very strongly with GD measures (r = 0.88 for men and 0.89 for women), indicating that occupational preference items that distinguished men from women also tended to distinguish heterosexual from homosexual individuals. LISREL 8 analyses showed that self-ascribed masculinity–femininity did not mediate the strong relation between sexual orientation and GD for men or for women.

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  1. Department of Psychology, California State University, Fullerton, California, 92834

    Richard A. Lippa

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Lippa, R.A. Gender-Related Traits of Heterosexual and Homosexual Men and Women. Arch Sex Behav 31, 83–98 (2002). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1014035302843

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