Can Heterosexist Music Cause Hiring Discrimination Against Sexual Minority Men? Testing the Effects of Prejudicial Media Messages

Abstract

Workplace heterosexism is a pervasive issue affecting lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) employees. This study investigated the influence of heterosexist media on hiring decisions by exposing 171 heterosexual undergraduate men to heterosexist rap music, nonheterosexist rap music, or no music and measuring their evaluations of a heterosexual and gay male professorial job applicant immediately afterward. As expected, participants exposed to the heterosexist music provided lower evaluations of the gay applicant than those exposed to no music, for two of the eight dimensions measured. Also, participants exposed to heterosexist messages were less willing to recommend and meet one-on-one with a gay candidate than a heterosexual one. Music condition effects remained, even with demographic factors controlled. These findings suggest that media heterosexism may affect hiring decisions for GBT men and may also influence the treatment of these men in a workplace environment.

Notes

¹Although they are often used synonymously, in this paper, “rap” is defined as lyrical, nonmelodic vocals or the genre of music that uses such vocals, and “hip-hop” is defined as the wider culture or movement that produced rap music.

²Although the LGBTQ-affiliated candidate never signified whether he was gay, bisexual, or transgender, he will be referred to here as the gay candidate for the sake of succinct writing.

³These three items were “How religious are you?”; “How often do you attend religious services?”; and “How often do you pray?” The first item was measured using a 5-point Likert scale anchored by 1 (Not at all) and 5 (Very). The other two items were judged on a 5-point scale ranging from Never to Very regularly.