The impact of community size on lesbian and bisexual women's psychosexual development : child maltreatment, suicide attempts, and self-disclosure

R. Mathy, H. Carol, M. Schillace

We tested competing hypotheses about the impact of ruralurban gradients on sexual minorities with a public Internet chat room sample (n = 82) and a community-owned coffee house sample (n = 92). We found associations between rural-urban gradient and reports of paternal maltreatment as a child as well as self-disclosure of sexual orientation to a family member. In the coffee house sample, rural-urban gradient mediated the mean age at which participants self-disclosed their sexual orientation to another person, close friend, family member, and parent, though it was associated in the Internet sample only with disclosure of sexual orientation to a family member. Rural-urban gradient was not associated with suicidal intent or victimization.[Copies are available from: Haworth Document Delivery Center. The Haworth Press, Inc., 10 Alice Street, Binghamton, NY 13904-1580, USA]