Advancing E-contact to Reduce Intergroup Anxiety and Increase Positive Attitudes Towards Individuals Who Identify as Bisexual

ABSTRACT

Bisexual individuals are invisible sexual minorities, who face prejudice and “double discrimination” from both heterosexual and sexual minority communities. Despite this, little empirical research has examined bisexual prejudice reduction. To address this, the current study tested an E-contact intervention – a highly structured, text-based, online interaction tool – to reduce bisexual prejudice. Heterosexual participants (N = 170) were randomly allocated to an intergroup (E-contact) or intragroup (control) interaction, with either a male or female interaction partner. Findings indicated that intergroup E-contact resulted in less intergroup anxiety compared to an intragroup interaction, and that this effect was more pronounced when the bisexual interaction partner was male for heterosexual men, but not for heterosexual women. Although E-contact had no direct effect on tolerance toward bisexual individuals or the perceived stability of bisexuality as a sexual orientation, findings revealed that reduced intergroup anxiety mediated the effect of E-contact on these outcome variables. This result was found in the intergroup dynamic of heterosexual men interacting with bisexual men, providing an important experimental demonstration of the potential for harnessing an E-contact intervention to reduce affective prejudice toward bisexual individuals.

Acknowledgments

We acknowledge the Gadigal and the Wangal peoples of the Eora nation, upon whose ancestral, unceded lands this research was conducted. We pay our utmost respect to Elders past and present. We particularly acknowledge all First Nations Australians, in their ongoing struggles for sovereignty and justice. We thank members of the SUPIR Lab from the School of Psychology, for their voluntary contributions in initial stages of refining the E-contact protocol. We thank David Yu for technical assistance with the E-contact tool and those who helped by providing feedback and participating in the study.

Author’s Contributions

Amaani Hatoum and Fiona White contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection and analyses were performed by Amaani Hatoum. The first draft of the manuscript was written by Amaani Hatoum and subsequent versions were developed in collaboration with Fiona White. The final manuscript was read and approved by both authors.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Research Involving Human Participants

The present research involved human participants. Ethical approval to conduct the research was approved by the authors’ institution’s Human Research Ethics Committee (Protocol Number: 2020/226). The research was conducted according to these standards.

Informed Consent

All participants read a Participant Information Statement allowing them to make an informed choice as to whether they wanted to participate in the research or not. They were informed that they could also cease participation at any stage with no penalty to them. The ethics of the consent procedure was approved as above.