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Specific Cross-Gender Behaviour in Boyhood and Later Homosexual Orientation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 January 2018

R. Green ,
C. W. Roberts ,
K. Williams ,
M. Goodman  and
A. Mixon
R. Green*
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Science, UCLA School of Medicine, Los Angeles
C. W. Roberts
Affiliation:
Department of Sociology and Anthropology and Department of Statistics, Iowa State University
K. Williams
Affiliation:
Department of Sociology and School of Social Work and Community Planning, University of Maryland
M. Goodman
Affiliation:
School of Welfare, State University of New York at Stony Brook
A. Mixon
Affiliation:
Department of Sociology, State University of New York at Stony Brook
*
760 Westwood Plaza, Los Angeles, California 90024, USA
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Extract

Data from a group of males aged 13 to 23, who as children exhibited extensive cross-gender behaviour, was analysed. In boyhood they frequently played with dress-up dolls, role-played as females, dressed in girls' clothes, stated the wish to be girls, primarily had girls as friends, and avoided rough-and-tumble play. The majority of the group evolved a bisexual or homosexual orientation; two types of behaviour, boyhood doll play and female role-playing, were found to be associated with later homosexual orientation. The findings suggest developmental associations between specific types of boyhood cross-gender behaviour and the objects of later sexual arousal.

Type
Papers
Information
The British Journal of Psychiatry , Volume 151 , Issue 1 , July 1987 , pp. 84 - 88
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal College of Psychiatrists 

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