Fear and cultural background drive sexual orientation prejudice in France (original) (raw)
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Fear and cultural background drive sexual prejudice in France – a sentiment analysis approach
Open Psychology
Sexual prejudice and its negative consequences remain major issues in Western societies, and numerous studies have tried to pinpoint its sociocultural underpinnings. However, most research has operationalized sexual prejudice via self-report measures or via implicit association tests (IATs), although it surfaces in language use and can be traced in spontaneous speech. Here, we report results from an experimental study investigating sexual prejudice in a corpus of spontaneous speech samples. Specifically, we tested in a context-sensitive sentiment analysis approach which attitudes (negative vs. positive) and emotions (joy, sadness, anger, fear, disgust) were voiced by the participants in response to picture prompts displaying homosexual couples. We also considered the sociocultural basis of prejudicial attitudes, in particular the effects of the participants’ cultural background (France vs. Maghreb), age and gender. We find strong effects of cultural background and gender both on the...
Quality & Quantity, 2021
Discrimination against LGBT people represents a significant and long-standing societal problem that occurs in several forms, including lexical discrimination, which consists in frequent usage of discriminatory epithets. Lexical discrimination produces a vicious circle where speakers grow subconsciously accustomed to abusive language and marginalisation becomes institutionalised. A vast literature has tackled lexical discrimination, providing several country-level studies. The cases of France and Italy are described as very different: while the French experience is centred around grassroot mobilisation, Italy features a traditional strategy of silence. This work aims to verify such difference empirically. Using a rich and detailed dataset, we apply time series analysis on the frequencies of usage of the terms that characterise male homosexuality. Our results highlight some similarities and some differences between the French and the Italian case, stressing the importance of lexical r...
Sexual Prejudice in the Portuguese Political Context
The Social Sciences, 2021
Sexual prejudice is a negative attitude toward an individual due to their belonging to a group defined by sexual minority behaviors, attractions, or orientations. As no studies assessing sexual prejudice levels among self-identified politicians have been conducted in Portugal, this study was carried out to address this gap in the literature. In addition, we sought to compare differences in levels of sexual prejudice by gender, religiosity, and political orientation. The sample consisted of 302 self-identified active politicians in Portugal, of whom 157 were men (52%) and 145 were women (48%), with an average age of 45.98 years. Study measurement instruments included a sociodemographic questionnaire and the Sexual Prejudice Scale in the Portuguese Political Context. Participants responded to this study’s outreach online, and they received emails that referred them directly to the online survey. The principal results show that, despite moderate overall levels of sexual prejudice among...
Social norms and prejudice against homosexuals
The Spanish journal of psychology, 2009
Different studies regarding the role of norms on the expression of prejudice have shown that the anti-prejudice norm influences people to inhibit prejudice expressions. However, if norm pressure has led to a substantial decrease in the public expression of prejudice against certain targets (e.g., blacks, women, blind people), little theoretical and empirical attention has been paid to the role of this general norm regarding sexual minorities (e.g., prostitutes, lesbians and gays). In this sense, the issue we want to address is whether general anti-prejudice norms can reduce the expression of prejudice against homosexual individuals. In this research we investigate the effect of activating an anti-prejudice norm against homosexuals on blatant and subtle expressions of prejudice. The anti-prejudice norm was experimentally manipulated and its effects were observed on rejection to intimacy (blatant prejudice) and on positive-negative emotions (subtle prejudice) regarding homosexuals. 13...
Where’s the sex in sexual prejudice?
2006
This article reviews the history of the concept of anti-lesbian/gay prejudice and contemporary findings in the field. It is argued that since the 1970s psychologists have become less likely to research heterosexuals’ sexual practices as evidence of prejudice and more likely to research gay and bisexual men’s sexual practices as evidence of internalized prejudice. Concurrently, support for sexual orientation based equality has grown such that contemporary heterosexist prejudice is ambivalent and involves both support for equality and lingering dislike of lesbians, gay men, and bisexuals. It is argued that the zoning of public space for displays of heterosexuality and the concurrent stigmatization of lesbians, gay men, and bisexuals in terms of their sexual practices represent one means of enacting heterosexism while expressing support for sexual orientation based equality.
Cultural Stereotypes and Personal Beliefs: Perceptions of Heterosexual Men, Women, and People
The present research prioritizes minority groups' perspectives, specifically in the context of lesbian, gay, bisexual, queer, and transgender (LGBQT) and heterosexual dynamics. Study 1 elucidates LGB people's knowledge of stereotypes about heterosexuals, whereas Study 2 examines the extent to which LGBQT people believe in stereotypes about heterosexuals. In Study 1, we asked a large sample of LGB-identified participants to describe cultural stereotypes that exist about heterosexual men, women, or people (gender unspecified) and analyzed the data in terms of frequency and thematic content. Results indicated that cultural stereotypes about heterosexual targets are gendered (e.g., macho and aggressive; hyper-feminine and submissive) and negative in content (e.g., closed-minded and judgmental). In Study 2, we measured LGBQT participants' personal endorsement of cultural stereotypes about heterosexual target groups (generated by participants in Study 1). The results of Study 2 demonstrated that LGBQT participants' beliefs about heterosexual men and people overlap, whereas participants tend to perceive heterosexual women in a favorable light. Taken together, these 2 studies offer new insight into intergroup relations between sexual minorities and heterosexuals by evaluating the cultural stereotypes and personal beliefs held by LGBQT people.