Lesbian internalized homophobia in relation to same -sex relationships, feminist attitudes, and coping resource

Internalized homophobia in lesbians. The purpose of this article was to critically review the literature concerning internalized homophobia in lesbians. It discusses the significance of studying internalized homophobia, provides a rationale for researching internalized homophobia in lesbians separately from gay men, reviews published scales used in assessing internalized homophobia in lesbians, describes recent studies on the correlates of internalized homophobia in lesbians, and identifies variables that have been theoretically linked to internalized homophobia in lesbians but have not been empirically examined. Implications for research and practice are discussed.;Lesbian internalized homophobia in relation to same-sex relationships, feminist attitudes, and coping resources. The purpose of this study was to investigate how internalized homophobia is related to fear of intimacy and various relationship variables, feminism, and coping resources in a sample of 210 female participants. Participants were recruited via a coming out group, several lesbian listserves, and friendship networks using the snowball method. Respondents completed a demographic questionnaire and the following measures: Lesbian Internalized Homophobia Scale [LIHS] (Szymanski & Chung, in press), Fear of Intimacy Scale [FIS] (Descutner & Thelen, 1991), Attitudes Toward Feminism and the Women's Movement Scale [FWM] (Fassinger, 1994), Sense of Coherence Scale, short form [SOC-13] (Antonovsky, 1987), and various items developed for this study to assess duration of longest relationship, relationship pattern, self-identification as a feminist, and involvement in feminist activities. Lesbian internalized homophobia was largely unrelated to fear of intimacy, duration of longest relationship, and relationship pattern. Lesbian internalized homophobia correlated negatively with self-identification as a feminist, attitudes toward feminism, involvement in feminist activities, and coping resources. Stepwise regression analysis identified attitudes toward feminism, involvement in feminist activities, and coping resources as significant predictors of internalized homophobia, accounting for 30% of the variance in LIHS total scores. Research and practice implications are discussed.