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Judgments of Sexual Orientation and Masculinity–Femininity Based on Thin Slices of Behavior: A Cross-Cultural Comparison

Abstract  

Studies of North Americans suggest that laypeople can judge the sexual orientation of others with greater than chance accuracy
based on brief observations of their behavior (i.e., “gaydar” exists). One factor that appears to contribute to these judgments
is targets’ degree of masculinity–femininity. However, behaviors related to sexual orientation and to masculinity–femininity
might vary across cultures. Thus, cross-cultural work is needed to test whether judgments of sexual orientation are more accurate
when targets and raters are from the same culture. American and Czech male targets, 38 homosexual and 41 heterosexual, were
videotaped and brief segments of the videotapes were presented to American and Czech raters. Overall, raters’ judgments of
targets’ sexual orientation were related to targets’ self-reported sexual orientation. However, the relationship was stronger
when targets were judged by raters from their own country. In general, results suggest that there are both cross-cultural
similarities and differences in gaydar and in cues related to sexual orientation.

  • Content Type Journal Article
  • Pages 1-8
  • DOI 10.1007/s10508-011-9818-1
  • Authors
    • Jaroslava Valentova, Department of Anthropology, Charles University, Husnikova 2075, 1500 Prague 5, Czech Republic
    • Gerulf Rieger, Department of Human Development, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA
    • Jan Havlicek, Department of Anthropology, Charles University, Husnikova 2075, 1500 Prague 5, Czech Republic
    • Joan A. W. Linsenmeier, Department of Psychology, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, USA
    • J. Michael Bailey, Department of Psychology, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, USA
    • Journal Archives of Sexual Behavior
    • Online ISSN 1573-2800
    • Print ISSN 0004-0002
Posted in: Journal Article Abstracts on 09/02/2011 | Link to this post on IFP |
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