Attitudinal Change Toward Same-Sex Parents: the Effect of the Explanation of the Etiology of the Homosexual Sexual Orientation

Attitudinal Change Toward Same-Sex Parents: the Effect of the Explanation of the Etiology of the Homosexual Sexual Orientation. Livia García, Gloria Garcia-Banda, Marcos Pascual-Soler, Laura Badenes-Ribera. Sexuality Research and Social Policy, https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s13178-017-0313-x

Abstract: The attributional theory of stigma maintains that the rejection of the stigmatized group increases when attributions are made to controllable causes rather than to genetic factors. Our study has two objectives: one, to provide evidence for the bifactorial structure of the scale of Beliefs about Children’s Adjustment in Same-Sex Families Scale (BCASSFS); and two, to carry out a direct replication of a previous experimental study about the effect of the etiology of the homosexual sexual orientation on attitudes toward same-sex parents. The sample was composed of 229 Spanish university students with a mean age of 26.18 years (SD = 9.43). This study demonstrates that the rejection of same-sex parents is greater when the homosexual sexual orientation is attributed to learning. The effect is observed in the scores on the two subscales: traditional rejection or individual opposition and modern rejection or normative opposition. The practical implications of our findings are related to homophobia intervention programs in educational settings or in the promotion of social change.