Part V: Relationships, Families, and Youth
Chapter 8: LGBTQ+ Relationships and Families
Sarah R. Young and Sean G. Massey
Learning Objectives
Upon completion of this chapter, students will be able to do the following:
- Explain the social construction of sex, gender, and sexuality.
- Describe the ways that LGBTQ+ people form relationships and the configurations of LGBTQ+ relationships.
- Describe the myths that exist regarding the quality of LGBTQ+ relationships and the research that refutes those myths.
- Describe how people struggle for social justice within historical contexts of inequality.
- Describe some of the negative consequences of homophobia, heterosexism, and minority stress and the ways LGBTQ+ people manage those consequences.
- Identify different types of LGBTQ+ family formations, including challenges to family formation and family building.
- Describe sources of stress and buffers for LGBTQ+ families and for LGBTQ+ individuals within their families of origin.
- Analyze how key social institutions shape, define, and enforce structures of inequality.
- Describe challenges that some LGBTQ+ families have in interacting with public and private systems, including legal, health care and human services, and educational systems.
- Describe the relationship between LGBTQ+ history, political activism, and LGBTQ+ studies.
- Articulate the queer viewpoint on LGBTQ+ relationships and families.
Introduction
This chapter provides an overview of research and practice relating to LGBTQ+ families, relationships, and parenting. It describes the definitions LGBTQ+ people have for family and the relationships LGBTQ+ individuals have with their families of origin. It investigates how minority stress, family acceptance, and rejection affect these relationships. The chapter discusses how LGBTQ+ people form intimate relationships, how people in these relationships navigate established (often discriminatory) social and legal systems, and how recent social and legal changes (e.g., marriage equality) affect these relationships. It talks about the nature and prevalence of families headed by LGBTQ+ people that include children and the ways that LGBTQ+ people become parents. It reviews the changing legal landscape as it relates to same-sex parenting and family building and delineates some of the challenges these families face when interacting with legal systems, health care and human services providers, and educators. The final section considers what it means to come out as LGBTQ+ to one’s children. Each section also critically explores the relevant scientific literatures, challenges existing anti-LGBTQ+ myths, and identifies resources and organizations that support LGBTQ+ families.
It is difficult to quantify how many people in the United States are in LGBTQ+ relationships. U.S. census data give us some idea, although the numbers are likely underreported. The U.S. census counted approximately 10.7 million adults (4.3 percent of the U.S. adult population) who ide