Societal relationships and gender role in homosexuals: A cross-cultural comparison

The proposition that feminine gender role in male homosexuals is a function of societal sex roles and attitudes toward homosexuality, as well as parental factors, was examined by administering tests of gender role, gender role conservatism, and attitudes toward parents to a sample of 176 Swedish and 163 Australian homosexual men. With homo sexuality constant, it was found that feminine gender identity was more characteristic of the homosexuals in the more gender-role rigid and anti-homosexual society (Australia), independent of differences in perceptions of parents. This was taken to indicate support for the hypothesis that in anti-homosexual societies with rigid gender roles, opposite-sex gender identity in homosexuals will be, to some degree, a function of believing that heterosexual relationships are the only appropriate ones, and that individuals who are homosexual will thus validate same-sex preference by opposite-sex identification. The findings also support the more general hypothesis that gender role is based on societal, as well as parental, models.