A Meta-Analysis of Disparities in Childhood Sexual Abuse, Parental Physical Abuse, and Peer Victimization Among Sexual Minority and Sexual Nonminority Individuals

By Mark S Friedman, Michael P Marshal, T. Guadamuz, Chongyi Wei, C. Wong, E. Saewyc, R. Stall. American Journal of Public Health, 2011

677 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Objectives We compared the likelihood of childhood (i.e., <18 years) sexual abuse, parental physical abuse, and peer victimization based on sexual orientation. Methods We conducted a meta-analysis of adolescent school-based studies that compared the likelihood of childhood abuse among sexual minorities vs sexual nonminorities. Results Sexual minority individuals were on average 3.8, 1.2, 1.7, and 2.4 times more likely to experience sexual abuse, parental physical abuse, or assault at school or to miss school through fear, respectively. Moderation analysis showed that disparities between sexual minority and sexual nonminority individuals were larger for (1) males than females for sexual abuse, (2) females than males for assault at school, and (3) bisexual than gay and lesbian for both parental physical abuse and missing school through fear. Disparities did not change between the 1990s and the 2000s. Conclusions The higher rates of abuse experienced by sexual minority youths may be one of the driving mechanisms underlying higher rates of mental health problems, substance use, risky sexual behavior, and HIV reported by sexual minority adults.

Subfields: Clinical Psychology, Health, Social Psychology

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/244b5b83df623046b92d3a1a7638f6c2bced6b14

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In Clinical Psychology

In Health

Dorothy Espelage

In Social Psychology

Citations in the corpus

Contemporary Issues in Sexual Orientation and Identity Development in Emerging Adulthood (2013, background): “Email: emorgan2@springfieldcollege.edu (e.g., Savin-Williams, 2005), sexual minority emerging adults continue to experience alarming levels of discrimination and victimization (e.g., Friedman et al., 2012).”
Bullying Explains Only Part of LGBTQ–Heterosexual Risk Disparities (2012, background): “First, in contrast to the research and policies mentioned above, other researchers have argued that preventing bullying may be only one component of a supportive school environment (Friedman et al., 2011; Kosciw et al., 2010; Murray, 2011; Russell, Kosciw, Horn, & Saewyc, 2010; see also Garofalo et ”
General and LGBTQ-specific factors associated with mental health and suicide risk among LGBTQ students (2019, background): “Consistent with previous research (Balsam et al. 2010; Buller et al. 2014; ClementsNolle et al., 2018; Espelage, Merrin, & Hatchel, 2018; Friedman et al., 2011), experiencing abuse or violence from someone close was also associated with increased risk for all four outcomes in multivariate analyses, ”