Abstract
Why do some heterosexual people react in a negative manner when pondering or experiencing romantic or sexual overtures from persons of their same-sex, whereas other heterosexual people react more positively? To answer this question, this cross-sectional, correlational study examined individual difference predictors of heterosexual people’s responses to romantic or sexual overtures from same-sex persons. Our sample comprised 306 men and 307 women, ages 18–35 years, who were recruited from Mechanical Turk and identified as cisgender and heterosexual. Our hypotheses were premised on the theoretical construct of reactive group distinctiveness. Specifically, we explored predictors of heterosexual individuals’ negative perceptions of same-sex overtures. We found that more negative reactions to same-sex overtures were uniquely predicted by old-fashioned sexual prejudice, modern sexual prejudice, and desire to be perceived as gender conforming, via the mediators of social distance from same-sex sexual minority individuals and desire to be perceived as heterosexual. Gender moderated these relationships inconsistently. These findings indicate that two classes of individual differences—sexual prejudice and gender conforming reputation desire—are uniquely associated with heterosexual persons’ reactions to overtures from same-sex persons. We explain how these findings evidence the process of reactive group distinctiveness.
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Notes
In this study, we defined overtures as indications of romantic or sexual interest in another person.
In this paper, the term sexual minority refers to people whose sexual orientation is other than heterosexual or asexual, including gay, lesbian, bisexual, and queer people.
We define “gender identity” as identifying with a particular gender category (i.e., seeing oneself as a man, woman, or agender) and gender expression as conveying conformity or nonconformity to dominant societal gender roles (i.e., conveying masculinity, femininity, or androgyny).
Percentages for race do not add up to 100% because participants could select more than one racial category.
We used the phrase “hitting on” because of its common colloquial use among the generation under study. Although some may perceive the phrase “hitting on” in a negative manner, there are two reasons we are confident that this phrase was not perceived this way in our study. First, the definition of “hitting on” provided to participants did not have negative connotations. Second, the mean scores for negative reactions were 1.99 for other-sex suitors and 2.48 for same-sex suitors. Since only scores above 3 (on a 5-point scale) indicate negative reactions, these scores demonstrate that participants, on average, did not have negative reactions to being hit on.
In addition to negative emotions, the measure contained some neutral and some positive emotions. Percentages of respondents who selected each of the six negative emotions ranged from 3.6 to 55.6% for other-sex overtures and 5.9% to 64.9% for same-sex overtures. One negative emotion (“depressed”) was excluded because less than 1% of participants selected it.
We changed “I would be uncomfortable at a party where X was present” to “I would be uncomfortable at a party talking to X” and we changed “being seen in a gay [heterosexual] bar” to “being in a gay [heterosexual] bar.”
We also examined these correlations separately among women and men, and found similar patterns: Women’s recalled and hypothetical reactions to same-sex and other-sex overtures were correlated (r[305] = .39 and r[305] = .41, ps < .001), as were men’s (r[304] = .51 and r[304] = .22, ps < .001).
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This research project was funded by three grants from Springfield College to Laurel Davis-Delano: (a) Dean’s Scholarship Course Release, (b) Faculty Research Grant ($750), and (c) Summer Grant ($2500).
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Davis-Delano, L.R., Kuchynka, S.L., Bosson, J.K. et al. Heterosexual People’s Reactions to Same-Sex Romantic or Sexual Overtures: The Role of Attitudes About Sexual Orientation and Gender. Arch Sex Behav 49, 2561–2573 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10508-020-01804-w
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10508-020-01804-w