This study explored the relationship between voters' political behavior regarding the issue of gay rights and the underlying psychological needs served by their attitudes on this issue. A telephone survey of 100 randomly selected local voters was conducted, during which Herek's (1987) Attitude Functions Inventory (AFI) was administered. Three of the four attitude function subscales (Experiential- Schematic, Social-Expressive and Ego-Defensive) were confirmed using a LISREL confirmatory factor analysis. The Value-Expressive subscale was not confirmed and showed poor reliability. Pro- and anti-gay rights behavior was measured using a Political Behavior Index (PBI) developed for this study. Regression analyses and MANOVAs were employed to test six hypotheses, all of which received some support. Pro-gay rights behavior was associated with ExperientialSchematic attitudes and a Value-Expressive item regarding civil liberties. Anti-gay rights behavior was associated with Ego-Defensive attitudes and a Value-Expressive item regarding moral beliefs. Men scored higher on the EgoDefensive function than did women. Those who knew more gay people were more likely to exhibit Experiential-Schematic attitudes and were less likely to hold Ego-Defensive attitudes. These findings imply that efforts to change anti-gay rights behavior need to address the underlying motivations of Ego-Defense and Value-Expression regarding the construct of moral beliefs. An additional implication is a potential for increasing support for the legal rights of gay people by increasing association with people one knows to be gay.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:pdx.edu/oai:pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu:open_access_etds-5602 |
| Date | 18 June 1992 |
| Creators | Young, Josephine |
| Publisher | PDXScholar |
| Source Sets | Portland State University |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | Dissertations and Theses |
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