Institute for Social Science Research, The University of Queensland.
J Sex Res. 2021 May-Jun;58(5):612-624. doi: 10.1080/00224499.2020.1814092. Epub 2020 Aug 27.
Sexual attraction, behavior and identity are subject to change across the life course for some individuals, and certain developmental periods such as emerging adulthood appear particularly conducive to this. However, the evidence documenting these phenomena comes overwhelmingly from data collected 10-20 years ago. In the brief interlude since, the socio-political context has changed markedly and increasing numbers of women are reporting non-heterosexuality. Drawing on contemporary data from the Australian Longitudinal Study on Women's Health (n = 16,870), we provide up to date evidence on changes in sexual identity labels among emerging adult women. We found that 19% of women changed their sexual identity label from one survey wave to the next, and 30.6% changed their identity label at least once across the four waves. Mostly heterosexual and bisexual labels were both more common and more stable in our sample than in previous studies. We propose a new typology of sexual identity sequences and fit this to our data, providing a blueprint for researchers looking to define sexual minority status longitudinally. Findings suggest that the ways women perceive and label their sexual orientation should be treated as dynamic phenomena situated within the nested temporalities of biographical and historical time.
性吸引、性行为和身份在一些人一生中会发生变化，某些发展阶段，如成年早期，尤其有利于这种变化。然而，记录这些现象的证据绝大多数来自于 10-20 年前收集的数据。在这短暂的时间间隔内，社会政治环境发生了显著变化，越来越多的女性报告自己是非异性恋者。本研究利用澳大利亚女性健康纵向研究（n=16870）中的当代数据，提供了关于成年早期女性性身份标签变化的最新证据。我们发现，19%的女性在一次调查到下一次调查之间改变了她们的性身份标签，30.6%的女性在四次调查中至少改变了一次身份标签。在我们的样本中，大多数异性恋和双性恋标签比以前的研究更为常见和稳定。我们提出了一种新的性身份序列类型学，并将其应用于我们的数据，为研究人员提供了一个在纵向研究中定义性少数群体地位的蓝图。研究结果表明，女性对自己性取向的感知和标签应该被视为一种动态现象，这种现象存在于传记和历史时间的嵌套时间性中。
