Gender-related friend preferences of youths with different sexual orientations: the effects of gender role and sexual attraction

ABSTRACT

The current research aimed to investigate gender-related preferences of youths with different sexual orientations and examine the effects of gender role and sexual attraction. In Study 1, participants from China recalled the gender composition of their friends at different times, and data from 216 of them aged 17–24 were analysed. Growth curve models showed that more than half of the friends of heterosexual individuals were same-gender ones and they had an increasingly larger ratio of cross-gender best friends through adolescence, while gay men and lesbians had an increasingly larger ratio of same-gender friends and more than half of them had same-gender best friends. Gay men had a larger ratio of cross-gender friends in primary school than heterosexual men, while lesbians had a larger ratio of same-gender friends at university than heterosexual women. In Study 2, participants from China ranked their preferences for a set of character profiles and reported their gender role, and data from 141 of them aged 16–24 were analysed. Gay men and lesbians preferred same-gender persons to cross-gender ones. Gender role of the participant had an independent effect on preferences to a character with a given gender role. Findings indicated that sexual orientation has a strong impact on the gender composition of youths’ friendships, and more attention should be paid to sexual minorities in this field of research.

KEYWORDS:

• Sexual orientation
• youth/adolescence
• friendship
• gender role

Acknowledgments

The authors thank the LGBT groups, including Colorsworld Group, Purple Group, and Rainbow Group, that strongly supported their research in recruiting participants. They also appreciate their lab members who provided invaluable ideas in discussion.

Disclosure Statement

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Supplementary Materials

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed here.

Notes

1. The main effects and interactions of the first and the second dependent variables were meaningless and removed from the model because all participants ranked the targets in 1–6.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National College Students Innovation and Entrepreneurship Training Program under Grant 201710001056; and the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant 31872782, 31571134.

Notes on contributors

Jingmeng Cui

Jingmeng Cui was an undergraduate student at Peking University, China when conducting this work. After graduating in 2019, he is now a research master student at Radboud University, the Netherlands. His research interests include the development of interpersonal relationships in adolescence, particularly for sexual minorities, and applications of statistical methods in psychological science.

Meng Pei

Meng Pei is a research assistant at the Lab of Developmental & Comparative Psychology, School of Psychological and Cognitive Sciences, Peking University, China. His research interests include the development and determinants of prosocial/antisocial behaviors, testing and measurement, and statistics.

Yanjie Su

Yanjie Su Ph.D. is a professor at the School of Psychological and Cognitive Sciences, Peking University, China. Her research interest focuses on evolution and development of mind, particularly the emergence and development of theory of mind, and the relationship between social behavior in social organization and intelligence evolution.