Measurement Invariance of Psychological Distress, Substance Use, and Adult Social Support across Race/Ethnicity and Sex among Sexual Minority Youth

ABSTRACT

Research on intersectional differences among sexual minority youth (SMY) relies on population-level datasets to ensure sufficiently large samples to explore between-group differences and assess the influence of axes of oppression/privilege. I argue that a structural equation modeling framework for investigating intersectional differences among SMY increases the nuance with which we understand heterogeneity and provides tools for ensuring that variables measure comparable constructs across diverse populations – an assumption of traditional univariate methods that is rarely empirically verified. Using a subset of SMY that identified as either White or Hispanic/Latino and male or female from the New Mexico Youth Risk and Resiliency Survey (N = 3,654), this study tested invariance of three latent constructs: psychological distress, substance use, and adult support across sexual orientation, race/ethnicity, sex, and three-way intersections of those identities. Analyses established invariance across race/ethnicity and sex of all constructs among gay/lesbian youth. Partial invariance models were required to account for intersectional differences in substance use among bisexual youth and in psychological distress among questioning youth. This study models a novel strategy for examining how social location at the intersection of multiple axes of oppression/privilege shape behavioral health and social support and paves the way for significant advances in research on SMY.

Acknowledgments

The author would like to thank Dr. Margaret Rosario (Associate Editor) and three anonymous reviewers for their constructive and insightful comments. The author would also like to thank Dr. Katie Witkiewitz for providing invaluable guidance and support in the design and execution of this research.

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Supplementary Material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed on the publisher’s website.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities (NIH-NIMHD) under Grant [F31MD014044], National Institute of Child Health and Development (NIH-NICHD) under Grant [R01HD083399], and National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIH-NIAAA) under Grant [T32AA018108].