Consistent with this notion, Wohlford, Lochman, and Barry (2004) found that participants were more likely to have high self-esteem if they believed they shared many character traits with their role models than if they believed they shared few traits with their role models. This finding is significant in part because Ochman demonstrated that positive portrayals of media characters who share similarities with an individual can produce changes in the individual's self-perception.
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Ochman (1996), for example, found that exposing children to same-sex storybook characters who were strong, positive role models enhanced children's positive self-concepts. Thus, contextual factors, including the effects of the media, should be considered when studying GLB identity.Īs Hammack's (2005) framework of GLB identity development suggests, cultural factors such as the media may influence important psychological domains, including individuals' self-perceptions. For example, in interviews with lesbian participants from varying age groups, Parks (1999) found that participants' sexual identity development, including the timing and the meanings ascribed to developmental events such as coming out, was related to the social and cultural context in which participants developed. Although there appears to be a biological basis for same-sex attraction (for a review, see Rahman & Wilson, 2003), each individual who experiences this attraction will likely develop a distinct sexual identity due in part to the influence of such cultural factors. Indeed, the GLB identity development process, including the realization of one's same-sex sexual desires and coming out, has been conceptualized as a dynamic process that is mediated by the cultural and historical context in which GLB individuals live ( Hammack, 2005).
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In Study 2, we sought to extend the findings from Study 1 by conducting qualitative in-depth interviews with GLB individuals in an attempt to uncover the processes by which the media interacts with GLB identity in a way that the survey format of Study 1 did not allow.Įmpirical attention on the relationship between the media and GLB identity can be justified by the role of contextual factors in GLB identity development ( Hammack, 2005). In Study 1, we sought to confirm the existence of the relationship between the media and GLB identity by conducting a quantitative survey of GLB participants at a gay pride festival in Texas. As such, the purpose of the current investigation was to examine the influence of the media on GLB identity.
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As the prominence of gay, lesbian, and bisexual (GLB) figures in the media has risen, it seems likely that the media's impact on the lives of GLB individuals has also grown. In the years since Ellen, television shows such as Will and Grace, Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, and The L Word, movies such as Brokeback Mountain and Angels in America (which was also an influential play), and musical artists such as Melissa Etheridge, Rufus Wainwright, and The Indigo Girls have emerged, appealing to a wide audience of both homosexuals and heterosexuals. Ever since Ellen DeGeneres made television history by coming out of the closet on her popular primetime sitcom Ellen in 1998, gay and lesbian characters have become increasingly prominent in the media (see Gross, 1994, and Hart, 2000, for discussions).