Racialized Sexual Discrimination (RSD) and Psychological Wellbeing Among Young Black Gay/Bisexual Men (YBGBM)

Abstract

The vast majority of research addressing the health needs of young Black gay/bisexual men (YBGBM) has focused on sexuality and HIV, and there is a deficit of research exploring issues related to racism and psychological wellbeing among this population. In this dissertation, I examine an understudied phenomenon that I define as Racialized Sexual Discrimination (RSD), which describes the sexualized discriminatory treatment that gay and bisexual men are subject to in online social venues. I attempt to build upon the largely qualitative literature on this topic by applying a mostly quantitative methodological approach. First, I conducted an exhaustive review and synthesis of literature that examines gay/bisexual men of color's experience with RSD, as well as racial discrimination more broadly. I discuss this phenomenon in a stress and coping framework, and examine the ways in which RSD may contribute to poor psychological health outcomes. Next, I conducted a mixed methods research project to develop a scale to measure the full scope of the phenomenon, and evaluated the new scale using exploratory factor analysis. I successfully constructed the scale after conducting a series focus groups, and getting feedback from cognitive interviewees and a panel of expert reviewers. The results of the factor analysis revealed an eight-factor structure of RSD under three core domains: 1.) White-Centric Domain (white supremacy and white inferiority); 2.) Black-Centric Domain (white rejecting black, black rejecting black, white desiring black, and black desiring black); and 3.) Neutral/Non-directional Domain (Degradation and Role Assumptions). Finally, I sought to determine whether RSD was related to poor psychological health outcomes among a sample of YBGBM. To do so, I examined the association between six subscale across the Black-Centric and White-Centric domains on two psychological health outcomes (depressive symptoms and feelings of self-worth) by estimating twelve hierarchical linear regression models. The analyses revealed that (1) white supremacy, black rejecting black, white desiring black, and black desiring black were all significantly associated with higher depressive symptoms; and (2) white desiring black was significantly associated with lower feelings of self-worth. This study is among the first to explore the relationship between RSD and markers of psychological wellbeing using quantitative analyses, and provides preliminary evidence that RSD is negatively associated with psychological wellbeing among YBGBM. Implications and future directions for this work are discussed.