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from Clinical/Therapeutic Issues
New Zealand School Of Medicine
Studies Mental Health Problems
In Young Gays
August 22, 2005 -
In July, 2005, the Christchurch School of Medicine and Health Sciences,
Christchurch, New Zealand, published the results of a study of the mental health
of young gay men and women.
The study, "Sexual orientation and mental health in a birth cohort of young
adults," was published in Psychological Medicine, (2005, 35, 971-981) from
Cambridge University Press.
The researchers designed the study to discover the relationship between sexual
orientation and mental health in a birth cohort of young men and women between
the ages of 21-26.
The first aim of the study was to develop "an empirically based classification
of sexual orientation" based upon sexual behavior, stated sexual preference, and
sexual attraction. The second aim was to "extend and confirm previous research
on this cohort showing that young people reporting gay, lesbian, and bisexual
orientation were at increased risks of mental health problems."
The study included a Composite International Diagnostic Interview to determine
the following disorders in young gays: major depression, anxiety, panic
disorder, agoraphobia, alcohol dependence, cannabis and other illicit drug
dependence, and more.
The researchers also collected information about the childhood of each gay
person. One category was childhood sexual abuse. This included non-contact abuse
to incidents of oral, anal, or vaginal intercourse. Of those surveyed, 11.9%
indicated they had experienced some form of sexual abuse.
In addition, 13.1% reported incidences of parental criminality; and 24.2%
indicated a parental history of illicit drug abuse.
In comparing the mental health of "exclusively heterosexual" and "predominantly
homosexual," young adults, researchers discovered that gay males experienced
major depression: 71.4% compared to 14.5% for heterosexual males; illicit drug
dependence: heterosexual: 11.1%; homosexual: 42.9%; suicidal ideation:
heterosexual: 10.9%; 71.4% for homosexual males; suicide attempts among
heterosexuals: 1.6%; 28.6% among homosexual males.
Applied Implications?
The research team noted that their findings may "reflect the effects of social
prejudices, homophobic attitudes, victimization and harassment in increasing the
vulnerability of bisexual, gay and lesbian young people to mental health
problems."
They also noted, however, that there is a possibility that their conclusions are
incorrect due to measurement errors; or that there is reverse causality
involved. An individual prone to mental health problems may be more likely to
engage in gay behaviors; or there is "the possibility that lifestyle choices
made by young people of non-heterosexual orientation place them at greater risks
of adverse life events, stresses and similar factors that may increase risks of
mental health problems."
New Zealand NARTH Member Responds
Dr. Neil Whitehead, author of My Genes Made Me Do It, has reviewed this
study and surveys the results of three previous papers on this subject. He
observes:
This paper confirms that the mental health risk for men with
same-sex attraction is about five times that of heterosexual norms and
[homosexual] women's risk is nearly twice as high.
This follows a cluster of three papers around the turn of the century which
affirmed the same thing. One of those three was a New Zealand paper on the same
group of 1,000 children followed from birth and by the same study group, but at
age 21 rather than 26 for the present paper.
The authors of this current paper allowed for other social and family factors
such as change of parents and childhood physical or sexual abuse, parental drug
use and novelty seeking, but the effect remained. This means that the result was
not chance - it has persisted in the study group from ages 21 to 26. The authors
extended this finding to say that even a small amount of same-sex attraction
(SSA) contributes to a significantly greater mental health risk.
Mental health factors studied were major depression, anxiety disorder, alcohol
dependence, illicit drug dependence, suicidal ideas, and attempts.
This mental health effect exists in spite of the work of Dickson, et al. ("Same
sex attraction in a birth cohort: prevalence and persistence in early
childhood," Social Science & Medicine, 56:1607-1615, 2003) which (apart from a
fascinating documented account of changes in type of sexual attraction between
ages 21-26) found that same-sex contact between two men was regarded as always
or mostly wrong by 36.3% of men and 22.2% of women, compared with 62.1% of men
and 48.9% in the UK and 70.7% of men and 66.8% of women in the US. This makes
New Zealand extraordinarily liberal in its attitudes, but the health effect is
very similar to that in the US, suggesting social prejudice has little to do
with the poorer mental health.
In spite of this, the authors suggest social prejudice may be to blame, but also
wonder if young people with psychiatric disorders are somehow more prone to
same-sex attraction, or alternatively that young people with same-sex attraction
make lifestyle choices which "place them at greater risks of adverse life
events, stresses and similar factors that may increase risks of mental health
problems."
This is worth following up, although it cannot be a universal factor. If it were
a universal factor all those with major depression would also have SSA. It could
be an important factor for a few. Some people exist with both SSA and
heterosexual attraction. They find that when they are depressed that SSA
predominates; when they are filled with well-being, opposite sex attraction
predominates.
Additional Reading: Homosexuality and Mental Health Problems by Dr. Neil Whitehead.
Updated: 8 February 2008
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