A new study exploring the attitudes toward non-heterosexual men and women in 23 Western and non-Western countries found lesbians are more accepted than gay men around the world. Now though this study may not be of much of a surprise to some, it certainly offers some interesting finds.
“We found that gay men are disliked more than lesbian women in every country we tested,” according to the study, which was conducted by three New York University psychologists and published in the December issue of the journal Social Psychology and Personality Science.
According to NBC News, the study’s findings also suggest that “men are more likely to be both the targets and perpetrators of sexual prejudice.”
In all 23 countries studied, the report found "gay men are rated more negatively than lesbian women,” and that trend was almost entirely driven by the views of men, except in Poland, Hungary and Russia, where women also assigned gay men high negative ratings. In the United States, men who are anti-gays largely direct their prejudice toward gay men, while women who are anti-gays direct their prejudice more equally toward gay men and gay women, the study found.
The study also showed that the following countries: Argentina, Australia, Belgium, Canada, Great Britain, Spain and Sweden all have more positive attitudes toward sexual minorities than do Americans.
Respondents in Brazil, China, Hungary, Japan, Peru, Poland, Russia, South Africa, South Korea and Turkey all reported more negative attitudes toward gay people than the U.S., while attitudes in France, Germany, Italy, and Mexico largely mirrored America’s.
Read the full study here.
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