Abstract
Intimate partner violence among gays and lesbians has gained increased attention in recent years. The present study assessed mutual partner violence within a gay, lesbian, bisexual (GLB) community sample to explore how mutual partner violence relates to the use of psychoactive substances. The results suggest that individuals engaging in mutual partner violence are more likely to report the use of numerous drugs than other subjects. However, this finding holds more consistently among men. The results also indicate that the exchange of violence is more significant for substance use than the particular type of violence involved. The authors suggest that minority stress may be an underlying mechanism of both substance use and partner violence and may contribute to the intersection of these deviant phenomena in the GLB community.
Acknowledgments
The Sex and Love Project was supported by the Hunter College Center for HIV/AIDS Educational Studies and Training (CHEST), under the direction of Jeffrey T. Parsons. The authors acknowledge the contributions of other members of the Sex and Love Research Team—Michael R. Adams, Anthony Bamonte, Lauren DiMaria, Catherine Holder, James P. Kelleher, Juline Koken, and Brooke Wells.
Notes
n.s. = not significant.
*p < .05, **p < .01, ***p < .001. n.s. = not significant.
*p < .05. n.s. = not significant.
*p < .05, **p < .01, ***p < .001.
Controlled for Age, Race/Ethnicity, Gender, Sexual Identity.