“I Don’t Get to Choose What I Am”
Bisexuals’ Perceptions of Support in Regards to Minority Stress
Kelly Niner 11096551 Supervisor: Bojan Bilic Second Reader: Margriet Van Heesch Sociology Masters Programme Gender, Sexuality & Society kellyniner@gmail.com 21 August, 2016
Abstract Bisexual individuals experience more mental health issues and problems with their psychological wellbeing than their monosexual counterparts, and LGBT teens are more inclined to use the internet to seek out support when it is not available to them in person. However little research has been done to asses bisexuals perceptions of support and their perception of the internet in regards to support, particularly as adults. The following thesis uses the minority stress theory as a qualitative framework through which interviews were analyzed to atone for these gaps in research. Tentative findings suggest that bisexuals perceptions of support are colored by their experiences with discrimination, especially that of bisexual erasure, stigma, and stereotyping. Furthermore, the internet is perceived as a tool to acquire supportive communities and networks when inperson support is not available. Acknowledgements Firstly, I absolutely have to thank my advisor, Bojan, for his incredible patience with me. In the realm of adult masters’ students, I am a toddler. Thank you for letting me figure it out. Secondly I have to thank my partner, Jamie, for pretending like he understood foreign sociological words like “subjectivities” and letting me verbally vomit my messofabrain all over him on a regular basis, just because I needed it. You are my rock. You keep me stable. I love you. Thirdly I have to thank my friends, both near and far, for keeping me laughing throughout. And lastly, but certainly not least, I need to thank my family. Particularly my mother who, despite being more than 4,000 miles away, still picked up the phone whenever I needed her to tell me it was all going to be OK, and that, yes, I am smart enough to do this. Thank you for always believing in me.
Table of Contents 1. Introduction 3 1.1 Relevance 4 1.2 Research Questions 6 1.3 Thesis Roadmap 7 2. Literature Review 9 2.1 Bisexual Erasure, Biphobia & Stereotypes 9 2.2 Minority Stress 12 2.3 Mental Health and WellBeing 13 2.4 Social Support, Collective Self Esteem and the Internet 15 3. Methodology 19 3.1 Data Collection 19 3.2 Data Analysis 22 3.3 The Participants 22 3.4 Codes 23 4. Analysis 27 4.1 Bisexual Stereotypes, Erasure, & Stigma 27 4.1a Bisexual Stereotypes 28 4.1b Bisexual Erasure 31 4.1c Bisexual Stigma 33 4.2 Community Inclusion & Exclusion 35 4.2a Exclusion by Default & Alternative Options 35 4.2b Exclusion by Choice & the Buffering Effect 38 4.3 Social Support and Perceptions of WellBeing 40 4.4 Social Support and Perceptions of Judgement 42 4.5 Summation of Results 49 5. Discussion 51 6. Conclusion, Limitations and Suggestions for Future Research 53 7. References 55 8. Appendix 59
1. Introduction The year was either 2002 or 2003, back before the seemingly omniscient social websites and search tools like Facebook and Google became prominent key players to help us precisely catalogue our lives. I was sitting in front of my computer waiting for my best friend to log on to AOL Instant Messenger; the super cool, new way of chatting to your pals online when school was out. I had been talking myself up to this point for weeks and I was nervous, clicking through the forums I had poured over for the past year or so where my online friends reassured me that everything would turn out just fine. Finally, she logged on. We exchanged our usual, teenage greetings, whatever they happened to be at that point, and, finally, I held my breath, typing as quickly as I could. I don’t remember the exact details of the conversation, but I remember dancing around the issue for as long as I possibly could, too anxious to spit out the words that my best friend really needed to hear, until finally our conversation went something like this; Friend: wait, you’re gay?!!?!?! Me: 50%!! And that’s how I came out as bisexual to my best friend. We talked a bit more and other than the actual shock of it all she took the whole thing better than I ever could have imagined. Up until that point I had only been out to my friends online and the prospect of coming out to any of my friends in real life (IRL) petrified me. What would happen if they did not accept me? What would happen if I lost someone I cared about because of who I am? These questions faded into the background of my mind as my friend and I continued chatting as usual, and yet it still took me two or three more years to finally pluck up the courage to divulge the exact same information to my younger sister. At that point I had more friends who knew, but it wasn’t something we talked about, and I often wonder if that had something to do with the fact that I constantly perceived myself as the only queer one in a group of heteros. When I finally did come out to her, we were waiting at a red light in my car; “Bec, I’m bisexual.” “Cool.”
I do not know why I thought it would go any other way, honestly. My family has always been supportive of me, and yet it took years of building up relationships with people online through lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) friendly forums and websites for my conviction to cement. In retrospect these memories have helped me realize how important, if not necessary, the internet was to my own journey of selfdiscovery in regards to my sexuality. From the first moment I logged in to a gay chat room, the internet gave me the opportunity to explore what I was feeling and make connections with other people who were feeling the same; confusion, sadness, fear, exhilaration, anxiety, passion. Online I didn’t have to play the role of ‘Kelly From Maryland Who is Super Normal and Therefore Straight,’ and instead I was just Kel, this anxious and troubled bi girl who, before talking to other LGBT kids, had always assumed that everyone imagined kissing both genders. The relationships I formed with my friends from these groups is something I firmly believe allowed me stability, and more importantly, support. I started wondering if I was the only one who turned to the online world in search of support, and if others like me had similar experiences. 1.1 Relevance, “What about the ‘B’? Fast forward to years later and I’m sitting in a university class aptly titled “Gays and Lesbians in America.” My sexual identity was a significant part of me at that point, and yet, as a bisexual woman who had predominantly dated men, I kept finding myself set apart and wondering whether there was actually space for me in this broader, supposedly more tolerant and inclusive, LGBT community. I had heard all of the stereotypes at this point; from “you’re just doing it for attention” to “can’t you make up your mind?” to, my favorite, “but you’re dating a guy, so you’re straight now, right?” Even this class, which covered everything from the revolutionary Stonewall Riots to the thencurrent political debate revolving around samesex marriage, left my identity (and therefore myself) out of the conversation. In fact, only time I remember explicitly talking about bisexuality was during our discussion of the Kinsey scale the 0 to 6 spectrum of sexuality developed by Alfred Kinsey in the late 40’s. Once the topic was brought up another peer of mine exclaimed, quite animatedly, “but everyone’s bisexual in college” to a response of giggles and nods of agreement from most of the class. This blatant dismissal and invalidation of my identity was the first time I had felt the effects of bisexual erasure IRL, yet unfortunately not the last. I found this exclusion even more pressing when topics of LGBT and sexualminority related suicide and selfharm were mentioned, and even more poignant when coming to realize
how much more atrisk we bisexuals are because of the stigma we face in both heterosexual and homosexual communities (Jorm et. al, 2002; D’Augelli, 2002; Doty et al, 2010; Skegg et al. 2003; Flanders, Dobinson & Logie, 2016). In attenuating this exclusion I came to realize that part of this estrangement is due to the invisibilization of the bisexual identity (Angelides, 2006; Alarie & Gaudet, 2013) and the stigma and phobia that work in tandem to allow the erasure and delegitimization of the bisexual identity to continue (ObradorsCampos, 2011). I was on good terms with the professor of the aforementioned class and I could have said something, but watching nearly the entire class agree with the erasure of my identity (no matter how playfully it was done) reaffirmed my perception that I would be rejected, and that my identity in this space, like most spaces, was not one to be taken seriously. This lead me to wonder what avenues of support are available specifically for bisexualidentifying individuals since the stigma and phobia we face is perceptually twofold due to our minority status in both the heterosexual community and the LGBT community (Meyers, 2003; D’Augelli, 2002). Previous studies have focused on how support processes work on the micro level and yet often times we see this sort of research continuously lump bisexuals into the same category as gays and lesbians (Mohr & Sarno, 2015; ObradorsCampos, 2011), while many quantitative studies focus on refining or discovering new methods of measuring bisexual stigma (Bostwick, 2012; Logie & Earnshaw, 2015). Even current qualitative research tends to focus on the relationship between social support and young LGB individuals (Flanders et al., 2016; Detrie & Lease, 2007), with a significant gap regarding the relationship between social support and bisexual adults. From within this concept of social support for sexual minorities we see the trend of the internet being used as a supplemental tool, particularly for youth, and yet current research has failed to consistently show that these two are linked (Doty et al, 2010). This knowledge gap is even more alarming when we take into account that almost a third of LGB young people in the US do not report harassment (Hillier, MItchell & Ybarra, 2012), that LGB young people are more likely to receive support online as opposed to offline (DeHaan et al, 2013; Hillier, Horsley & Kurdas, 2004; SavinWilliams, 1994), and that previous studies indicate that online identity creation and management, including the concept of identity play, is better negotiated when individuals have networks of support that they can rely on in the offline world (DeHaan et al. 2013; McDermott & Roen, 2012; Davis, 2011). With the landscape of the internet constantly changing to adapt to a
culture that is saturated in social media, I have to wonder if youth are still using the internet in this way and how older individuals perceive the internet in relation to their identity as bisexuals. If these processes have indeed changed, then what role has the internet adapted in regards to support for bisexual youth who experience minority stress, and what kind of support may the internet offer to older bisexual individuals in this day and age? (Niner, 2015) 1.2 Research Questions This brings me to my main research question: What are bisexuals’ perceptions of social support? Through the interviews I have conducted and the relevant observational data I have collected, I aim to establish what support, as a concept, looks like to bisexual individuals. This main research question has two subquestions. The first of which; What are bisexuals’ perceptions of social support in regards to minority stress? aims to attenuate which avenues of social support bisexual individuals consider the most important in regards to their minority status as bisexuals (Meyer, 2003) in both heterosexual and nonmonosexual communities and spheres of living (D’Augelli, 2002; Angelides, 2012). My second subquestion is then; What are bisexuals’ perceptions of the internet in regards to social support? Previous research has examined how the internet may be used as a potential buffer for youth who experience victimization due to their sexual orientation (Ybarra, Mitchell, Palmer, & Reisner, 2015) and how the internet offers social support for those who seek it out (Eastin & LaRose, 2004), yet there is a significant gap in research when contending with the nuances of identity for bisexual individuals and the possibility of the internet providing social support for those who are no longer youths. In summation, there has been little research done from a perspective that attempts to both clarify what support looks like as a concept to bisexual individuals, young and old, how minority stress might affect perceptions of support
, and where the internet lies in regards to the
relationship between perceived social support and minority stress for bisexuals. It is my hope that by unpacking this word, support, which will take on numerous faces throughout this thesis in an attempt to catalogue and dissect its roots, researchers can potentially benefit from a more nuanced definition that allows for both for individual subjectivities and practical application in future research.
1.3 Thesis Roadmap In the following chapter I will elaborate on some of the aforementioned concepts previously mentioned in order to give a decent background on the most pertinent literature to my research. This will include diving deeper into understanding the concepts of social support, minority stress and stigma, monosexism, bisexual erasure, biphobia and in which ways they may affect or shape bisexual identities, and bisexuals’ mental health and wellbeing. This chapter will provide the framework that I will use later on in the discussion of my results. I will then provide the my methodology including how my data was collected, what method of analysis the reader can expect, and the relevant limitations and ethical considerations that went into conducting this research. And finally I will present my data and analysis using the aforementioned frameworks to provide evidence to my argument that perceived social support for bisexual individuals is predicated on their experiences of bisexual erasure, stigma, and stereotyping, and that the internet is perceived as as supplemental tool in regards to the specific stress that bisexual individuals experience.
The 1990 Bisexual Manifesto 1 We are tired of being analyzed, defined and represented by people other than ourselves, or worse yet, not considered at all. We are frustrated by the imposed isolation and invisibility that comes from being told or expected to choose either a homosexual or heterosexual identity. Monosexuality is a heterosexist dictate used to oppress homosexuals and to negate the validity of bisexuality. Bisexuality is a whole, fluid identity. Do not assume that bisexuality is binary or duogamous in nature: that we have "two" sides or that we must be involved simultaneously with both genders to be fulfilled human beings. In fact, don’t assume that there are only two genders. Do not mistake our fluidity for confusion, irresponsibility, or an inability to commit. Do not equate promiscuity, infidelity, or unsafe sexual behavior with bisexuality. Those are human traits that cross all sexual orientations. Nothing should be assumed about anyone’s sexuality, including your own. We are angered by those who refuse to accept our existence; our issues; our contributions; our alliances; our voice. It is time for the bisexual voice to be heard.
2 Literature Review 2.1 Bisexual Erasure, Biphobia and Stereotypes The marginalization of LGBT individuals is hardly a contested notion in the social sciences anymore, and yet the literature that focuses on the marginalization of bisexual individuals is sparse in comparison. In fact, current research suggests that the attitudes surrounding bisexuality have not changed by much in recent years (MacLeod, Bauer, Robinson, MacKay & Ross, 2015) and provides preliminary evidence that attests to the notion that the bisexual identity suffers at the hand of visibility because of the negative associations it carries rather than benefits from it (Callis, 2013). This is an intriguing inverse of the typical effects we see when marginalized and othered identities are pushed to the forefront, where increased contact with individuals in minority groups helps to normalize and validate them (Meyer, 2003; D’Augelli, 2002). Since the opposite is true for bisexual individuals I am driven to believe that this is due, at least in part, to the particular oppression and marginalization that bisexual individuals experience. As was previously mentioned, bisexual erasure and biphobia are critical players in the continued marginalization of bisexuals. Alarie and Gaudet (2013) expound on the marginalization of the bisexual identity when they found that emerging adults perceive the identity to be both nonexistent, and, paradoxically, devalued in comparison to monosexual identities (i.e. identities based on attraction to one
gender or one sex, such as homosexuality and heterosexuality). This
devaluation occurs by way of stereotyping the bisexual identity in two ways that vary depending on gender. For example, respondents in this study typically viewed women who practiced bisexuality in public (by kissing other women or being physically affectionate with other women) as a reaffirmation of a heterosexual identity under the assumption that it is only being done to please men. On the other hand, men who claimed the bisexual label were perceived as using the label solely for transitional purposes a stopping point on the way to and from one monosexual identity to another. Alarie and Gaudet (2013) continue to explain that these contradictory perceptions arise from the consistent association of the identity with other stigmatised forms of sexual behavior, such as promiscuity and hypersexuality, along with the marginalization of the identity itself which they attribute to monosexual identities and behaviors
having privilege over polysexual identities (i.e. identities based on attraction to multiple genders or sexes) and their aforementioned associated behaviors. In fact, much of the stigma surrounding the bisexual identity can be attributed to gender binarism and monosexism. ObradorsCampos (2011) explains how gender binarism, the “ontological position that determines to a large extent the way we perceive and understand genders and their dialectical relationship” (pp. 208) presents gender as an ‘either/or’ dichotomy that reinforces binary conceptualizations in our discourses. Through his use of Iris Marion Young’s framework for oppression, he argues that exploitation, cultural imperialism, 2 powerlessness, violence, marginalization, alienation, heteronomy, and stigma all contribute to and make up biphobia (i.e. the systemic oppression of bisexual individuals) to show how “bisexual people are acknowledged yet seen through a number of biased views that do not correspond to what’s real for them ” (ObradorsCampos, 2011; pp. 223; emphasis added). Angelides (2006) goes even further to suggest that this binary conceptualization, along with monosexism which upholds the same ‘either/or’ ideology in reference to sexuality, is the theoretical foundation upon which the bisexual identity rests. Without binary and complementary dichotomies the bisexual identity would not and could not exist since one cannot have a preference of ‘both’ if no ‘either/or’ conceptualization exists in the first place. In the same vein, Callis (2013) found that the participants of her study echoed this ‘either/or’ conceptualization in regards to bisexuality. This foundation, she argues, contributes a great deal to perceptions of bisexuals as oversexed, illegitimate, or dangerous. For example, bisexual women are interpreted as oversexed and wanting to sleep with many people, which leads to them being viewed as illegitimate in the sense that a bisexual woman is really just heterosexual and “doing it for the attention” of her male peers (Callis, 2013; Alarie & Gaudet, 2013) and simultaneously leads them to be viewed as dangerous, since being attracted to multiple genders and sexes is associated with a higher likelihood to cheat on significant others (Israel & Mohr, 2004). On the flip side, bisexual men are seen as dangerous because of their association with HIV/AIDS, leaving many heterosexual women in the study to comment that this would deter them from considering dating a bisexual man. They are also considered illegitimate based off the the transitional identity stereotype that they are really just gay and afraid to fully come out. And lastly, bisexual men are deemed oversexed for the same reasons as women,
however, bisexual men do not benefit from a perceived tolerance with this association the way that bisexual women do where bisexuality in females is more often accepted among heterosexual men because they believe it will benefit them sexually, most often referenced in the form of threesomes (Callis, 2013). Callis (2013) also found that the negativity derived from these misconceptions of the bisexual identity oftentimes lead people to choose alternative, nonmonosexual labels (such as queer or heteroflexible) partly due to fear of rejection that bisexuals experience from both heterosexual and LGBT communities. Similarly, in a 10 year longitudinal study of sexual minority women Diamond (2008) found that women who selflabeled as bisexual, lesbian and unlabeled were likely to change their identity label at least once in this time period. And yet, very few bisexual women exchanged their polysexual monikers for monosexual ones, further debunking the conceptualization of the bisexual identity as merely transitional and adding credence to the notion that the negativity surrounding the bisexual identity is so prolific that people would rather selflabel differently (Diamond, 2008). In fact, several of Callis’ (2013) respondents who did admit to using the bisexual identity as a transitional one mentioned that they regretted the decision and reflected upon how their own experiences might have helped to perpetuate this myth. In summation, we can see that much of the marginalization that bisexual individuals endure is a result of the dichotomous and oppositional binary structures that shape how we, as a society, construct sexualities and sexual orientations. This marginalization is then perpetuated through and by preconceived notions, damaging stereotypes, and (often) unfounded stigmatization of bisexual individuals by heterosexuals and members of the LGBT community. And yet, as we can see from the above excerpt of the Bisexual Manifesto, these stereotypes and stigmas are the same ones that the bisexual community has been fighting against for over 20 years with the result that increasing visibility of the bisexual identity is only met with further invalidation or stigmatization of the identity (Callis, 2013). Just as little as a few months ago, prominent actress Amber Heard had the legitimacy of her divorce from actor Johnny Depp questioned when a television anchor said, “it’s not wise to marry a bisexual,” using Heards’ previous marriage with a woman as proof of her supposedly inherent tendency to cheat (Noyes, 2016), perpetuating the notion that bisexual women cannot be trusted (Israel & Mohr, 2004). It is the very perpetuation of these aforementioned stereotypes by nonbisexual identifying others that leads us to the
current social circumstances where “most of the terms used to describe bisexuals have not been created by bisexuals themselves” (ObradorsCampos, 2011; pp. 214). 2.2 Minority Stress Since bisexual individuals are perceived negatively by heterosexuals and homosexuals alike (Israel & Mohr, 2004), and because I want to ground my analysis in the experience of bisexuals, it makes sense to use a framework that contends with how these experiences may affect bisexual individuals on the basis of their minority status in both heterosexual and queer communities (Lewis, Derlega, Brown, Rose & Henson, 2009). The minority stress theory is used to conceptualize the added stress that minority individuals experience due to their minority status and suggests that many mental health disparities among nonheterosexual identifying individuals may be attributed to this minority status (Meyer, 2003). This framework proposes 4 processes of minority stress that are particularly salient for LGB individuals. This first process includes objective stressful events and conditions, also commonly referred to as distal stressors, which include experiences of explicit discrimination and prejudice (Meyer, 2003). For example, let us say that a bisexual woman discloses her sexuality at a lesbian bar, only to be told by other nonbisexual individuals that she is not welcome there because she is not a lesbian. This experience of discrimination based solely on her identity as a bisexual would be considered a distal stressor under the minority stress framework. The second process of the minority stress theory involves the internal expectations of such distal stressors, and the vigilance this expectation requires of individuals to conceive of or expect distal stressors in particular situations (Meyer, 2003). This second process is also referred to as a proximal stressor, referring to the conceptualization of how distal stressors may affect how an individual may cope with minority stress. For example, in reference to the hypothetical outlined above, we could posit that the same bisexual woman might learn to expect similar experiences at gay and lesbian bars as a result the rejection she experienced due to her bisexual identity. True enough, current research suggests that the prevalent paradoxical stereotypes of bisexuals is enough to cause some women to alter their behavior in order to ‘prove’ their bisexuality, particularly in cases where said individuals did not feel ‘queer enough’ (Flanders et al., 2016). More importantly, there is a growing body of evidence that suggests these internal expectations of distal stressors may have significant direct and indirect effects on
an individual’s wellbeing and mental health (Brewster, DeBlaere, Moradi & Velez, 2013; Lehavot & Simoni, 2011). The third process of minority status revolves around the internalization of negative social attitudes about the individual’s minority status, often delineated as internalized homonegativity (Meyer, 2003). In this particular study, this last process includes both internalized biphobia and binegativity along with internalized homophobia and homonegativity, as both of these may have a significant effect on how a bisexual individual relates social attitudes to their self (Mohr & Sarno, 2015). For example, a bisexual woman who walks down the street holding hands with her samesex partner might experience distal stressors in the form of negative reactions from others, but because her identity as a bisexual woman is typically erased in this scenario it can be argued that this instance might contribute to internalized homophobia since the negative reactions of others is based on the perception of her as a lesbian and not as a bisexual woman. On the other hand, that same woman might experience distal stressors in the form of invalidating remarks about her bisexuality (‘but you’re with her so you might as well just call yourself a lesbian!’) which could then lead to internalized biphobia . In other words, “the diversity of experiences within any group of bisexuals may be associated with stigmatization from the [lesbian and gay] community, the heterosexual community, or both” (Lewis, Derlega, Brown, Rose, & Henson, 2009; pp. 977). Meyers (2003) also suggests that the concealment of one’s sexual orientation is an important stress process. In the same way that distal stressors may contribute to an individual’s internalization of society’s negative attitudes, there is preliminary evidence that suggests concealment of an identity is similarly related to, or a product of, external prejudiced experiences (Brewster, DeBlaere, Moradi & Velez, 2013). For example, the same bisexual woman who experienced exclusionary reactions to the disclosure of her identity at a lesbian bar might then choose to conceal her identity as bisexual at a lesbian bar in future scenarios in an attempt to mitigate the potential rejection of her identity from others. Previous research suggests that bisexual individuals might suffer from higher levels of internalized homonegativity and concealment of one’s identity than lesbian or gay individuals (Kuyper, 2006) and that both of these processes can have direct and indirect effects on an individual's sense of wellbeing (Brewster, DeBlaere, Moradi & Velez, 2013; Lehavot & Simoni, 2011).
2.3 Mental Health and WellBeing There is a decent amount of literature that contributes to the suggestion that bisexual identifying individuals suffer from worse mental health than lesbians or gays (Russel & Fish, 2016), although depending on methodology these outcomes are sometimes contested (Lewis, Derlega, Brown, Rose & Henson, 2009). In a large survey of adults in Australia, Jorm (2002) found that bisexual individuals scored the highest on measures for depression, anxiety, and negative affect, with homosexuals joining them only in their high potential for suicide. Similarly, in their study on sexual orientation in relation to mood and anxiety disorders, Bostwick, Boyd, Hughes & McCabe (2010) found that nearly 59% of bisexual women had reported suffering from depression at some point in their lifetime and that when separated from lesbian identifying women, scored the highest on measures for anxiety and mood disorders (Bostwick, 2012). Since then, researchers have contributed to this body of knowledge to provide further evidence that biphobia, bisexual erasure, and the unique stigma that bisexual individuals experience may have significant effects on the mental health and wellbeing of bisexuals (Flanders et al., 2016; Mason & Lewis, 2015). On a broader basis, research suggests that internalized homonegativity and internalized LGB stigma are related, either directly or indirectly, to poor mental health catalysts such as negative affect and problematic alcohol use (Lewis, Kholodkov, & Derlega, 2012), the perpetration of samesex partner violence (Edwards & Sylaska, 2012; Lewis, Milletich, Kelley & Woody, 2011), substance use (LeHavot & Simoni, 2011), anxious affect (Eldahan, Pachankis, Rendina, Ventuneac, Grov, & Parsons, 2015) and binge eating (Mason & Lewis, 2015). For example, in their study on the daily experiences of LGB individuals, Mohr and Sarno (2015) found that internalized stigma was positively related to negative affect and, inversely, negatively related to positive affect. When they focused on identity salient experiences a term used to reference any instance that make the individual aware of their minority status they found that positive ISEs with heterosexuals and other LGB individuals was generally related to lowerthanusual internalized stigma (Mohr & Sarno, 2015). This research suggests that positive experiences with other LGB people may reinforce one’s sense of community and belonging, and further validate
their identity, while positive experiences with heterosexuals may contribute to normalizing their identity so that LGB persons feel less marginalized on the basis of their sexual orientation (Mohr & Sarno, 2015). More specifically, there is also preliminary evidence that antibisexual prejudice and internalized biphobia are related to higher levels of distress, and that internalized biphobia has crucial negative associations with bisexual individuals sense of wellbeing (Brewster, Moradi, DeBlaere & Velez, 2013). In their study on older lesbian, gay, and bisexual adults in the Netherlands, Kuyper & Fokkema (2009) found that their homosexual participants had lower levels of internalized homonegativity and concealment of their sexual identity than their bisexual peers. Similarly, in their study on the daily experiences of minority stress for gay and bisexual men, Eldahan, Pachankis, Rendina, Ventuneac, Grov & Parsons (2015) found that anxious affect and negative affect were significantly associated with the four processes of the minority stress framework. A separate study echoed these results when D’Augelli (2002) found that the lesbian and bisexual women, among his pool of lesbian, gay, and bisexual youths aged 14 to 21, were more likely to register high scores on relevant mental health subscales than their heterosexual peers. For bisexual individuals in particular this evidence is alarming because of the stigma that they face from multiple communities (Lewis, Kholodkov, & Derlega, 2012). 2.4 Social Support, Collective Self Esteem and the Internet Because I am focusing on individuals who actively identify as bisexual, and because there is evidence to suggest that group membership for minorities may play an important role in ameliorating stress (Meyer, 2003) it is pertinent to discuss the relevant theories that can help us conceptualize this mediation. The term collective selfesteem refers to the relevant value and selfworth individuals place on their identity in accordance with a group membership (Luhtanen & Crocker, 1992). In other words, as Detrie and Lease (2007) explain it, “collective selfesteem results from the individual’s perceptions of the worth, value, and importance of their group membership” (pp. 177). This means that, for LGB persons and particularly for LGB identifying youth, having a strong sense of identity within a minority community may help to mitigate the negative effects of their minority status (Detrie & Lease, 2007). Since bisexual individuals regularly perceive prejudice and discrimination as coming from mainstream society and the LGBT community (Alarie & Gaudet, 2013; Lewis et al, 2012) it is not unreasonable to suggest
that bisexuals may not benefit from collective selfesteem in the way that gay and lesbian individuals do. It is important to mention, however, that this is only one of many potentially ameliorating factors when it comes to minority stress. For example, Gray & Demarais (2014) found that bisexual identifying individuals had significantly less collective selfesteem in comparison to lesbians and gays, while Detrie & Lease (2007) found that social support and social connectedness (wherein collective selfesteem was a subcategory) offered alleviating benefits to individuals psychological wellbeing depending on their age rather than their sexual orientation. It’s from within these concepts of minority stress and collective self esteem that we are able to understand the importance of social support and its relationship to the wellbeing and mental health of bisexual individuals. For the purpose of this thesis the term social support will refer to “an individual’s perception of general support or specific supportive behaviors (available or acted on) from people in their social network, which enhances their functioning and/or may buffer them from adverse outcomes” (Demaray & Malecki, 2002; pp. 306). Detrie and Lease (2007) found that perceived social support can be used, to a certain extent, as a predictor of psychological wellbeing in LGB youth and adults, and that the perceived social support from family and friends had the biggest effect on an individual’s wellbeing. In other words, lower perceptions of social support from friends and family were significantly related to lower rates of psychological wellbeing, so much so that those perceptions can act as a predictor to future mental health problems (Detrie & Lease, 2007). In regards to LGB(T) persons, social support has been found to act as a buffering agent in reference to the adverse effects of minority stress (Lewis et al., 2012) but that these buffering effects vary depending on the context of other personal identities that LGB(T) members incorporate (Russel & Fish, 2016). This is why I am interested in attenuating what social support looks like to bisexual individuals, as insights into these perceptions can provide a foundation for future research that is grounded in their unique experiences. According to a Pew Research Center survey (Lenhart, 2015), which looked into the amount that American teens used the internet as well as what websites were visited most often, 92% of American teens aged 13 to 17 use the internet every day. The findings varied depending on race and socioeconomic background, with more African American and Hispanic teens accessing the world wide web through smartphones and mobile devices while their white
counterparts had greater access to desktops. In the same vein, these African American and Hispanic youth also reported using the internet at higher rates than their white peers. Considering how often the internet is used by youth, and how prolific it has become in the West, it does not come as a surprise that many youth rely on the internet for support and information regarding their sexuality (DeHaan et al., 2013). Hillier and Harrison (2007) collected qualitative and quantitative data on how youth aged 14 to 21 practice same sex identity online. The study found that the prospect of anonymity plays an important role in identity play for teens online and even adds credence to the notion of the internet as a ‘safe space’ where questioning and queer youth can play with multiple identities (Hillier & Harrison, 2007). This idea is reiterated in Elizabeth McDermott and Katrina Roen’s (2012) study on youth who used the internet to explore their marginalized gender or sexual identities, many of whom pointed to the anonymity of the web when rationalizing the level of risk involved in such identity play (Niner, 2016). The notion that the anonymity of the internet provides a buffer zone wherein youth feel more comfortable expressing themselves is a major theme in the study of queer experience online (McDermott & Roen, 2012). Katie Davis’ (2011) study on 24 ‘digital youth’ ages 15 to 25 found that a number of youth admitted to using the internet as a safe space for identity play. This concept is even more salient when we consider that youth perceive their offline environments as unsafe for exploration into their sexual identities (DeHaan et al, 2013). In one study, a questioning, male teen recalls, “‘[Chatting] gives you the ability to bring about part of your personality that you may be too afraid to explore in real life,” (Hillier & Harrison, 2007, p. 89, brackets original) while another points out the safety that online identity and sexuality exploration offers, “On the net anonymity is the greatest asset. Nobody really knows who you are. In ‘real life’ there are grave risks involved in admitting to people who you are” (p. 95). It is a with careful calculation of this risk that many LGBT and queer or questioning youth turn to the internet as a source of solace (DeHaan et al., 2013; Niner, 2015). Besides strengthening already established offline community ties, research has also suggested that online interactions can actually better prepare youth mentally for dealing with negative individual reactions in the offline world (Subrahmanyam & Greenfield, 2008) Referring to this idea in terms of sexuality exploration, an 18 year old male notes “In virtual life you aren’t going to be as easily hurt by the rejection if this new aspect of your personality doesn’t rub well with others” (Hillier & Harrison, 2007, p. 89) when discussing how to go about meeting other
samesex attracted people online. This testimony to being able to “practice” samesex identity in the relative safety of the online world is reiterated by other youths who felt the internet offered them something akin to LGBT trainingwheels. An 18 year old gay man explains, “I’d say it [the internet] developed what was inside of me and aided me in learning about this lifestyle. It also allowed me to get a feel for it instead of one day just going to a club and being thrown into the whole scene” (Hillier & Harrison, 2007, p. 95 brackets original). However, with all of this being taken into account, there is still little research on what the internet offers youth in a day and age where anonymity has become nearly impossible online, or what the internet offers emerging adults and older individuals with nonheterosexual identities (Niner, 2015).
3. Methodology 3.1 Data Collection Interviews For the purpose of this thesis I conducted 13 semistructured interviews during the months of March, April, May and June of 2016, with selfidentified bisexuals, ten of whom fall into an age range of 14 to 26 years old, and three of whom are over the age of 40. By interviewing older people who identify as bisexual I collected data that captures the relevant changes experienced by those who will not have had access to the internet during the pivotal comingofage timeframe when many LGB individuals first selflabel and first disclose their identity to others (D’Augelli, 2002; Doty et al., 2010). That being said, I decided to disregard one of my interviews with a gentleman who was over 40, Ronnie , as it became clear during the interview that his 3 sexuality and sexual practices were more of a product of his struggles with sex addiction rather than a reflection of his own identity. I made this decision because I really want to focus on how those who claim the label of bisexuality (or similar labels, as I will explain below) perceive support, and since Ronnie revealed that it was his sexual practices that drove him to assume the identity, rather than identifying regardless of practice, I did not see him as necessarily belonging to the group I wanted to study. I also opted to forgo obtaining parental consent for individuals under the age of 18 as is typically expected in research, under the implications that obtaining such consent may cause these young people undue harm, particularly when research shows that younger sexual minorities tend to perceive the least amount of sexualityrelated support as coming from their family (Doty et al, 2010). I recruited my participants using snowball sampling by way of posting recruitment advertisements on various Facebook pages , all of which had either some kind of LGBT+ focus 4 or an explicit connection to the bisexual community. For each group, I contacted administrators first to ask if my recruitment post was acceptable. I wanted to ensure that the least amount of 3 Randomly selected pseudonym 4 Recruitment advert can be found in the Appendix.
harm was done, and even though I am bisexual myself, I understand the perception that a researcher could be taking advantage of inclusion to a vulnerable group, like the LGBT community, solely in order to obtain data. My recruitment advertisement stated my intention for the study and who I was looking to participate bisexualidentifying people from the ages of 15 to 21 (this was later amended) and over 40, with no current mental health issues and who could speak fluent English. My rationalization for these protocols was to make sure my interviewee pool all actively identified as bisexual (or a related, nonmonosexual sexual orientation), while the stipulations for mental health served to provide a source of data that would not potentially be clouded by other mitigating factors that may be the result of a participant being mentally unwell. Once I received a notification of interest from a potential participant I emailed them a brief explanation of my thesis and the aim of the study along with a demographics form and a consent form to be filled out and sent back to me. I had originally intended to gather hardcopies of both the demographic information and a signed consent form by email or in person. 5 However, upon realizing how few of my participants had easy access to printers, and how infrequently many people check their emails, I changed this requirement so that collecting the demographics by video chat and obtaining consent verbally became sufficient. This also meant that my primary way of communicating with my interviewees changed from email to Facebook messenger, since most of my recruiting was done using this platform. All of the interviews were conducted using either Google Hangouts or Facebook video chat, with the exception of Della, who I interviewed at her home upon her request, and Erica, who I interviewed at a local cafe. The interviews were recorded using an aural recording application on my phone and later emailed to my student email account and then backed up using my personal Google Drive. I conducted semistructured interviews using an interview guide which 6 was updated on a regular basis to include new questions and topics that arose out of the first few interviews. I chose to conduct semistructured interviews on the grounds that they allow for this very type of research, one that is more exploratory, and approaches from specific starting points while permitting the participants to decide what direction the interview will take through the course of conversation (Hennink, Hutter & Bailey, 2015). The biggest adjustment to my guide came halfway through the interviewing process when I realized that I never actually asked my participants what support looked like to them. This lack in judgement was particularly salient 5 Consent form and demographic form found in the Appendix. 6 Original and amended interview guides found in the appendix
to this thesis since previous research has yielded conflicting results on bisexual identifying individuals and minority stress, which varied depending on the methodological approach (Lewis et al., 2009; Balsam & Mohr, 2007). This question was then added to my guide and then followup interviews were set up so that I could collect the data I had missed from those interviews that had already been conducted. The process repeated itself in this fashion a few more times until I ended up with my final guide and fell into a rhythm with each of my interviewees. Upon completing each interview I asked all of my participants if they would be available or interested in a potential follow up interview later on, whereby all interviewees agreed. My purpose for this was to ensure that the cyclical nature of my qualitative research remained accessible where data collection, transcription, and analysis oftentime occur simultaneously (Hennink et al., 2015, Bryman, 2012). As was explained in the previous paragraph this turned out the be the best course of action for my research. Unfortunately, I did have one case where a participant, Daisy, agreed to a followup interview, only to not be available later. Daisy was contacted multiple times on Facebook messenger over the course of 3 weeks to no response. At this point in time I decided that she was no longer interested in participating in the follow up interview and ceased contact. I maintain, however, that Daisy is still comfortable with me using her original interview for my research since my consent form stated that voluntary removal from the study was always possible so long as the participant voiced this concern to me, the researcher. Because Daisy never expressed these views to me I believe that her voluntary participation in the study still holds true, and that her unavailability for the follow up interview must have been a product of other relevant time constraints. In the same vein, I originally had over 20 interviews scheduled, but because many potential interviewees lived abroad it was quite common for people to lose interest and stop responding, and a total of three potential participants did eventually notify me that they wished to drop out of the study. The rest were never heard from after the initial information on my study had been sent to them by email, and several attempts to contact them on Facebook messenger were unsuccessful. At this point in the process, aural recordings of the interviews were transcribed as soon as possible after the interview was held using the Chrome browser extension oTranscribe. At this time any and all identifying information within the transcripts was anonymized in order to protect the privacy of each interviewee. Quotes that I’ve pulled for the results section has been
edited for clarity, in that qualifying words and pauses have been removed for better cohesion, but have not been so edited as to alter the meaning or implications behind them. 3.2 Data Analysis Data analysis was conducted according to the principles of grounded theory whereby data collection and analysis happen simultaneously and analysis is used to develop explanatory frameworks (Hennink et al, 2015). By performing a content analysis of the interviews in search of codes, categories, and thematic concepts that are relevant to my research questions I am letting the data speak for itself. Again, this cyclical process is beneficial for this type of research as it can atone for gaps in previously collected data and, by allowing the process to be flexible, changes were easily made in an ongoing fashion once codes and themes emerged (Bryman, 2012; Hennink et al, 2015). The coding itself occurred in a linebyline fashion so as to ground inductive and deductive analytic comparisons from within the data that the interviews offered (Hennink et al, 2015). 3.3 The Participants The interviewees, all of whom were given pseudonyms to protect their privacy, and their 7 relevant demographic information can be found in the table below. From left to right this information covers and includes pseudonyms, age, gender identity, sexual orientation(s), country of residence at the time of the interview, level of education, relationship status at the time of the interview, and their occupations. I also originally asked all participants for their ethnicity, but I concluded not to employ this information in the table since all of my participants are White. Interviewees
Della 23 F Pansexual Netherlands Higher Ed. Single None
Anne 56 A8 Bisexual USA Higher Ed. Single Writer
Sadie 50 F Bisexual USA Higher Ed. Married None
Rose 21 F Bisexual Canada Higher Ed. Relationship Fast Food
Amy 14 F Bisexual USA High School Single None
Karyn 25 F Bicurious USA Higher Ed. Relationship Teacher
Dom 15 M Pansexual USA High School Relationship Umpire
Lisa 23 F Bisexual USA Higher Ed. Married Retail
Daisy 26 F Bisexual USA Higher Ed. Married Factory Work
Elena 26 F Bisexual USA Higher Ed. Single Museum Tech
Winni 22 F Bisexual USA Higher Ed. Relationship Teacher
Erica 24 F Bisexual Netherlands Higher Ed. Single None
All of this information was either filled out by participants themselves or transcribed verbatim from the interview. However, it’s important to note that I have collapsed the education category so that “Higher Ed.” denotes any education received after the equivalent of a United States high school diploma. It’s also pertinent to explain that, at least in this particular pool of people, those who are denoted as “Married” are married to someone of the same sex while those who are denoted as in a “Relationship” were all dating people of the opposite sex at the time of the interview. My decision to include other sexualities that are not monosexualities (such as pansexual and polysexual) comes from my own experience in coming to terms with my sexual identity. In learning that there are actually more genders than man and woman and that there are more sexes than male and female (FaustoSterling, 1993), I began to realize how little gender or sex mattered to me as stipulations for potential romantic and sexual relationships, and still identified as a bisexual woman. It was my understanding, an understanding I came to after many conversations with my LGBT friends online and in school, that bisexuality was not and is not the “male AND female” that I had previously assumed it to be back when I was proclaiming to be “50% gay”. Many bisexual people are used to hearing the binaryreaffirming argument in reference to bisexuality, which relies on the etymological latin origin of the prefix bi. In this 8 Anne described her gender identity to me as “agender woman,” and after speaking with her again on the intricacies of her gender identity she has assured me that this is the correct way to present it.
argument, the prefix is clung to by definition as meaning “two,” and because our society revolves around the idea that there is only man and woman, only male and female, it is no wonder that many assume it to refer to only an attraction to men and women. However it has been argued that this is a fallacy, predicated on a historical foundation that has only ever validated a system of knowing and understanding genders and sexes in binary, oppositional spectrums, one that is not only detrimental for those who find themselves outside of these either/or identities but also reinforces the assumption that bisexuality cannot be considered a valid sexual orientation (ObradorsCampos, 2011; Alarie & Gaudet, 2013). Thus, by including other, nonmonosexual identities while maintaining that my participants at least claim the label bisexuality even if it is not the label that they use the most I hope to ground my data and research in experiential evidence coming directly from bisexuals themselves. 3.4 Codes When I was operationalizing the minority stress theory for my interview guides I started out with some deductive codes that revolve around distal and proximal stressors. When referring to my original interview guide we can see these deductive codes begin to take shape. The first question, Do you consider yourself as ‘out’ or not? , aimed to attenuate where the individual was in their “coming out process” (if they, in fact, had one) and, in turn, contextualize the individual in their perceptions of minority stress, since Meyer explains that one of the key processes of minority stress is, in fact, the expectation and management of external stressful events (2013). Sure enough, this question and the question of concealing and ommiting ones seuxal identity turned out to be very closely related. I also asked questions about the individual’s coming out process if they had one and what it was like for them to gauge the same kind of perceptions on proximal minority stressors, as many individuals make decisions to leave certain people out of their process until the very end, and oftentimes this is because of a perception that, should the conversation go badly, the loss would be at a very great cost (D’Augelli, 2002). I also started with codes and questions that revolved around whether the individual had ever experienced discrimination. This question acted as an attempt to contextualize the individual in their perceptions on what discrimination is to them and how that discrimination affects them in their everyday lives. Not surprisingly many of these instances of discrimination were often times passive in the sense that my respondents would have an instance where something was said
about bisexuality, or about a bisexual individual, but not necessarily to them, that they inferred to be about them because of their sexual orientation. This was an important connection because of the fact that bisexual people experience biphobia and erasure from both the heterosexual and the queer community, and many of my respondents cases of discrimination are based on having to cope with biphobic views. This deductive code of “discrimination/prejudice” eventually produced an inductive subcode for biphobia and bierasure, along with a subcode for monosexism (whether implicit or explicit), and one for “subculture inclusion” which typically, but not always, referred to instances where individuals felt like they were “a part of the LGBT+ community” or not. The last deductive code that was operationalized for minority stress was “wellbeing” and was implemented by the question Are you happy with your sexuality? I asked this question in order to ascertain how a relevant comingout process might have affected an individual, and how they perceive outness, or contentment with their sexuality, to be linked with their own mental state and wellbeing. This was to highlight the foundation of the minority stress theory which posits first and foremost that stress and wellbeing are connected and affect each other (Meyer, 2013). This question eventually lead to two inductive subcodes, one of which I’ve titled “unwell” which includes and refers to all mentions of poor mental health by the interviewee (depression, selfharm etc), and “acceptance” which includes and refers to all mentions of feeling accepted by others and situational anecdotes wherein the participants reveal that they have accepted themselves as bisexuals and are content in their sexual identity. Following along in my interview guide, we then come to my operationalization of support. Much of this operationalization is based on previous research that indicates youth are more likely to rely on sexualityrelated social support (particularly friends) more than any other kind of social support available when dealing and coping with stressors related to their sexuality (Doty et al., 2010). The differentiation in my first question, Where do you turn to for emotional support? , where I’ve left the topic of sexuality out of the question, is intentional. I wanted to see if there is a specific hierarchy of trust when it came to who these individuals consider most valuable in providing support, and then further break it down to see if the hierarchy remained the same when the topic of sexual identity was introduced. I also made sure to outright ask who the individual might turn to for sexuality support, just in case my perception of this hierarchy was incorrect, and also because it allowed me to refer back to previous answers to clarify how the
individual felt about those specific persons and why or why not sexuality could be included on the list of things they could be considered supportive for. These questions produced an overall code of “support” which was then whittled down to produce three separate, albeit related, deductive subcodes; friends, family, and internet. After coding the first few transcripts a fourth inductive subcode presented itself; other. This subcode refers to any and all methods of support used by my interviewees and includes things like literature and television shows. I also discovered an inductive subcode that arose from the data, almost in opposition to the discrimination code, one I labeled “Openness/Nonjudgemental” and refers to moments where my participants describe others in that way, typically so as to infer why they would be a good candidate to rely on for social support. This code was also closely related to a separate inductive code of “religion,” whereby the two were generally used in the same anecdotal story or sentence, or whereby the first code was used to rationalize a person’s supportive behaviour in spite of their “religiousness.” The last important code I found useful for my research was another inductive code that I titled “pansexuality.” This code came out of discussing certain individuals preferences for the label as opposed to that of bisexuality, and caused me to add questions about individuals perceptions of the label to my interview guide. Once I started asking questions specifically about pansexuality I also added a subcode for “gender binarism” which arose out of many people’s own explanations between the differences of biseuxality and pansexuality. This was was especially important for my research as it positively reinforces my decision to include all multisexualities in this study, since many pointed to the aforementioned “bi means two” argument that proves to further marginalize the bisexual community from other lesbian, gay, trans and queer inclusive spaces and rhetoric.
4. Analysis Analysis of the transcripts revealed that nearly all of my participants had experienced bisexual erasure, stereotyping, or stigmatization for their bisexual identities barring the two youngest, Dom and Amy, and that these instances were often entangled in a contention with monosexism that shaped their perceived wellbeing. Participants also commonly mentioned either inclusionary or exclusionary experiences with the LGBT community, which they often connected to the perception of their identity being seen as either nonexistent or “not queer enough.” Perceptions of support were coded most often with use of words such as “open” and “nonjudgemental,” and were either implicitly or explicitly inferred as being contrary to religiousness. The internet was perceived by most age groups as a compendium of information or a tool of communication rather than a mechanism whereby avenues of support could be obtained, barring Sadie and Anne who relied on it heavily due to an absence of perceptually supportive people in their immediate surroundings. Lastly, participants mention overwhelming personal acceptance of their bisexual identities and displayed incredible awareness and introspection when topics of other polysexual identities were mentioned. 4.1 “I can’t make up my mind, but why should I?” Bisexual Erasure, Stigma and Stereotyping Many interviewees brought up experiencing instances of stereotyping, stigmatization, and bisexual erasure, and often linked these experiences with monosexism. More importantly, these experiences were often intermeshed with each other, where stereotypes provided the basis for stigmatization which then acted as grounds to perpetuate further erasure of the identity. When
