This was a collective case where lesbian survivors of childhood sexual abuse were studied. Resiliency is a combination of personality traits and environmental influences that serve to protect an individual from the harmful psychological effects of trauma (Bogar & Hulse-Killaky, 2006). The focus of this study was resiliency skills that lesbians used in working through childhood sexual abuse and clinical applications. Using a qualitative approach, specific inquiries included (a) what resiliency skills were used to work through childhood sexual abuse, (b) how counselors can be helpful and unhelpful, (c) what were some barriers to getting counseling, (d) what are the current resiliency skills, and (e) what advice a lesbian survivor of childhood sexual abuse would give to another survivor. Participants were interviewed about their level of satisfaction in various areas of their lives, their history of childhood sexual abuse, and their resiliency. Themes were revealed addressing the specific inquiries. Results are reported within the various categories suggesting that coping with childhood sexual abuse is possible. Clinical implications were concluded from the results and recommendations for clinical practice given.

Counselors and counselor educators must serve clients regardless of culture, race, disability, sexual orientation, and age. Counselor educators have attempted to stay abreast of new methods to enhance counselor competencies to adequately counsel lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) clients. The purpose of this quantitative study was to determine the extent of the relationship between self-perceived clinical preparedness of working with LGBT clients and self-perceived attitudinal awareness towards LGBT clients as moderated by levels of religious commitment of licensed professional counselor (LPC) using a feminist and multicultural theory framework. Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) quantitative analysis software program was used to generate descriptive statistics such as frequencies, means, modes, correlations, and regression models for each research variable. According to study results, there was a statistically significant relationship between the criterion variable self-perceived clinical preparedness of working with LGBT clients, the predictor variable self-perceived attitudinal awareness towards LGBT clients, and the moderator religious commitment (F (2, 123) = 4.76, p < .05). The study findings promote insight for counselors to understand how their religious commitment moderates the relationship between clinical preparedness and attitudinal awareness when working with LGBT clients.

In 2009, 713,220 new cases of cancer were diagnosed for women in the United States with more than a quarter million deaths. African American women and lesbians exhibit behavioral risk factors as well as diminished access to and utilization of breast cancer screening that reduces opportunities for early detection. This secondary analysis of a national convenience-based study examined screening compliance among 647 African American lesbian and bisexual women. Barriers to accessing screening represented the theoretical framework for this study. Bivariate chi square analysis was used to assess the association between independent variables: sociodemographic characteristics; participation in wellness activities; sexual orientation/gender identity; and experience with health care providers and the three dependent breast cancer screening compliance variables: breast self-examination (BSE), clinical breast examination (CBE), and mammography screening. Statistically significant associations between dependent and independent variables at the .05 level were further analyzed with logistic regression. Results of the ten regression models found that BSE was predicted by socioeconomic characteristics and participation in wellness activities. Compliance with CBE guidelines was predicted by sociodemographic characteristics, wellness activities, sexual orientation/gender identity and provider experience. Sociodemographic variables and provider experience also predicted mammography screening. Overall compliance was predicted by sociodemographic characteristics, namely insurance status. The social change implications of this research are an improved understanding of African American lesbian and bisexual women's screening behavior and guidance toward interventions that can improve and breast cancer screening compliance with guidelines.

In an exploratory study 10 adult children, with at least one identifiable gay or lesbian parent, were interviewed and asked to discuss their childhood experiences growing up in diverse families. Understanding the introspective views of adult children with gay or lesbian parents will allow social workers the ability to tailor services to ensure the needs of these new family constellations are met.

With a rapidly growing lesbian and gay older adult population, it is important to understand the attitudes and perceptions held by older adult service providers. A questionnaire was distributed to San Bernardino County's Area Agency on Aging's service providers with the purpose of exploring and assessing their attitudes and perceptions toward lesbians and gay clients. The study consisted of a secondary data analysis with a total of 145 cases. Results indicated that African American participants reported the most positive perceptions of how current agency clients might react toward their lesbian and gay peers whereas Latino/a participants reported the least positive perceptions. Participants that identified themselves as volunteers or students reported the lowest levels of awareness of lesbian or gay clients as well as the lowest levels of comfort in working with this population. Older participants reported the least positive perceptions of how agency staff would react to lesbian and gay clients. With the exception of the aforementioned results, participants' awareness of lesbian and gay clients within the agency, their perceptions of how staff and other clients would treat this population and their comfort levels reveals a general lack of understanding of the needs of the older adult lesbian and gay population regardless of participant ethnicity, gender, role within the agency and age. Recommendations include ongoing cultural competency training, the inclusion of sexual orientation in the intake assessment process, ensuring a safe environment, and the development of services aimed at responding to the needs of lesbian and gay older adults.

This study explores the attitudes of social workers in relation to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) adoptions. Race, gender, generation, position and prior LGBT training are factors that can positively or negatively impact social workers’ biases towards LGBT adoptions. Researchers contacted adoption agencies whom agreed to partake in the 26-question survey, including eight demographic questions and an 18 item scale. The current study used an adapted version of the Attitude Toward Gay Men and Lesbians as Adoptive Parent Scale (APS) (α = .95). There were 28 survey respondents, however two surveys were discontinued due to incomplete informed consents. A series of Mann-Whitney U tests were conducted to find if two independent, yet similar groups of people answered questions significantly different. Results show that men answered two questions significantly different than women participants who answered the same questions, and that administrative workers answered four questions differently than front-line service providers answered the same four questions. Limitations of this study include time; sample size; and an overrepresentation of women, heterosexuals and Caucasians. Further research should be done on this population, because they may directly impact the progression of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender adoptions.

Health and behavior risks among homeless Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer youth, are now part of nation wide conversation however, evidenced based practices and strategies for working with the youth remain very limited. This explorative study examined housing services, environments, and therapeutic interventions needed to help decrease high-risk behaviors among homeless Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer youth. In order to examine and distinguish the services needed to assist youth, the presenting study conducted an open-ended qualitative survey where nine social services providers delivered their expertise on the issues found among homeless Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer youth. The presenting study found that homeless Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer youth had experiences that were distinct and complex so as a result, needed cultural competent services and environments to better suit their needs. The participants of the study provided concrete details of encounters between social service providers and homeless Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer youth. From responses given, important insight was obtained on how to create safe and welcoming environments for at-risk or currently homeless Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer youth.

This exploratory research utilized a qualitative focus group of seven participants to see what insights older lesbian women provide toward impacting understanding of their perceived isolation, perceived invisibility, health needs and access to social services that are congruent with LGBTQ+ culture. The participants were recruited through snowball sampling. After the completion of the data collection, data were thematically analyzed and color coded. The significance of this study was to gain greater insight into the specific needs and areas of concerns of a vulnerable population. This greater insight may lead to social workers’ being able to provide better services for lesbian women. The major themes derived from the data were separated by access, homophobia, invisibility, social support, and health. Sub-themes included: quality of healthcare, support system, community involvement, political climate, coming out, need for LGBTQ+ specific services, discrimination (sexism/homophobia), finances, relationship status, health issues and social limitations, quality of life, planning, invisibility.

Out of the politically charged atmosphere of the 1960s and 1970s emerged a migration to "the land" and communes, which popularly became known as the back-to-the-land movement. This migration occurred throughout the United States, as well as many other countries, and included clusters of land based communities in southern Oregon. Within these clusters, lesbian feminist women created lesbian separatist lands and communes. These women were well educated, and politically active in movements such as the New Left, Civil Rights, Women's Liberation, and Gay Liberation. These lands or communes functioned together as a community network that developed and commodified lesbian art, which impacted and influenced the development of lesbian art over time. In Oregon, as of 2011, at least ten known lesbian lands still existed. This cluster belonged to an extended community that stretched down into California and over into New Mexico. Over a two-year period I collected, transcribed, and studied the oral histories of eight of the elders of the women's land movement in southern Oregon. The purpose of this study is to better understand this movement of lesbian feminists the development of lesbian art and culture over time. The lesbian feminist back-to-the-land movement made the conscious choice to disengage from the patriarchal mainstream rather than continue participation in their own oppression. They viewed lesbian feminist separatism and the creation of safe lesbian land as a way to reconstruct their self-identity and influence the continued self-perception of lesbians the world over through art and literature. Based on these oral histories and archival materials, it became evident that the women within the lesbian land communities developed and maintained land on which they could re-examine who they were, re-educate themselves and each other, learn practical skills, construct new identities, create art, and broadcast their creations out into the world through organized media networks. One of the key features of this construction of lesbian land culture was the desire to share--share power, share money, share responsibilities, share knowledge, share land, share lovers. On the one hand, ownership was eschewed as elitist and patriarchal, while simultaneously important to the continuity of women's land and its protection from what could be described as patriarchal profit motives. They developed infrastructure, altered language, created a spiritual practice, and made art. The material and artistic culture was created in concert with modes or mediums of transmission, casting it out to a much wider audience. These creative activities influenced and impacted women beyond Oregon, beyond the lesbian land communities, and beyond the 1970s. By examining the lesbian land movement in southern Oregon, we can better understand the impact on LGBTQ culture, and the continued albeit unintentional impact on the questioning of the gender binary and sexual identity. In other words, the feminist and queer questioning of identity construction and symbolic language began here.

The central research question of the current study had to do with self - an stereotypically- gendered identities of lesbians. The purpose was to determine the nature and form of gender identity and gender stereotypes among women who self-identify as lesbians, and more specifically, to determine whether or not “gender” means the same to lesbians as it does to heterosexual women. Identity measures were Bern’s (1974) Sex-role Inventory (BSRI) and a butch-femme rating scale. The sample consisted of 65 women who self-identified as lesbian. The lesbians in the current sample did identify more strongly with masculine attributes (Masculinity scale mean = 5.27) than with feminine attributes (Femininity scale means= 5.07). Interestingly, the current sample’s mean Masculinity scores were higher than those of women (heterosexual orientation unknown, and lesbians) in prior research. The majority of butches and femmes identified as masculine and feminine, respectively. As indicated from prior research subjects, and even more strongly among the lesbians in this study, traits such as “cheerful,” “shy,” “flatterable,” “childlike,” “does not use harsh language,” and “lives children” may no longer be self-descriptions of lesbians or heterosexual women. The lesbians in this study described themselves as assertive and independent and also as nurturant and sensitive. It may be that the terms like “agency” and “emphatic” will in the future be more useful than the dichotomized masculine and feminine labels.