Sexual Orientation Development
Sexual orientation is one component of a person’s identity, which is made up of many other components, such as culture, ethnicity, gender, and personality traits. Sexual orientation is an enduring emotional, romantic, sexual, or affectional attraction that a person feels toward another person. Sexual orientation falls along a continuum. In another words, someone does not have to be exclusively homosexual or heterosexual, but can feel varying degrees of attraction for both genders. Sexual orientation develops across a person’s lifetime-different people realize at different points in their lives that they are heterosexual, gay, lesbian, or bisexual.
Sexual behavior does not necessarily equate to sexual orientation. Many adolescents-as well as many adults-may identify themselves as homosexual or bisexual without having had any sexual experience. Other you people have had sexual experiences with a person of the same gender, but do not consider themselves to be hay, lesbian, or bisexual. This is particularly relevant during adolescence because it is a time for experimentation-a hallmark of this developmental period.
Gay, lesbian, and bisexual adolescents follow a developmental path that is both similar to and quite different from that followed by heterosexual adolescents. All teenagers face certain developmental challenges, such as developing social skills, thinking about career choices, and fitting into a peer group. Gay, lesbian, and bisexual youth must also cope with prejudiced, discriminatory, and violent behavior and messages in their families, schools, and communities. Such behavior and messages negatively affect the health, mental health and education of lesbian, gay, and bisexual young people. These students are more likely than heterosexual students to report missing school due to fear, being threatened by other students, and having their property damaged at school. The promotion of ‘reparative therapy’ and ‘transformation ministry’ is likely to exacerbate the risk of harassment, harm, and fear.
For these reasons, the experience of gay, lesbian, and bisexual teenagers is often one of isolation, fear of stigmatization, and lack of peer or familial support. Gay, lesbian, and bisexual youth have few opportunities for observing positive modeling by adults due to the general cultural bias that makes gay, lesbian, and bisexual people largely invisible. It is this isolation and lack of support that accounts in part of the higher rates of emotional distress, suicide attempts, and risky sexual behavior and substance use that gay, lesbian, and bisexual students report compared to heterosexual students.
Because of their legitimate fear of being harassed or hurt, gay, lesbian, or bisexual youth are less likely to ask for help. Thus, it is important that their environments be as open and accepting as possible, so these young people will feel comfortable sharing their thoughts and concerns. To be able to provide an accepting environment, school personnel need to understand the nature of sexual orientation development and be supportive of healthy development for all youth.
“Coming out” refers to the process of acknowledging one’s gay, lesbian, or bisexual attractions and identify to oneself and disclosing them to others. This process is different for every teenager; however, most adolescents disclose their sexual orientation to others in the following order: other gay, lesbian, and bisexual peers, close heterosexual peers, close family members, and finally parents.
Many people may wonder why gay, lesbian, and bisexual teenagers and adults feel the need to “come out”, i.e., disclose their sexual orientation to others. This is actually the expression of a normal tendency to want to share personal information about oneself with important others, and should be treated as such by those around the gay, lesbian, or bisexual adolescent. It is healthy for teenagers to share with friends and families their latest crush or how they spent their weekend. This process, however, is often quite difficulty for the gay, lesbian, or bisexual adolescent, because there is a strong (and well-founded) fear of being rejected by other.
A Publication Endorsed by:
American Academy of Pediatrics
American Counseling Association
American Association of school Administrators
American Federation of Teachers
American Pshychological Association
American School Health Association
The Interfaith Alliance Foundation
National Association of School Psychologists
National Association of Social Workers
National Education Association