The assistant professor of psychology's article, "Racial and Sexual Identities as Potential Buffers to Risky Sexual Behavior for Black Gay and Bisexual Emerging Adult Men," appears in the Journal of Health Psychology.
Assistant Professor of Psychology Buffie Longmire-Avital has co-written an article on the intersection of racial and sexual identities for emerging adult black sexual minorities.
In the article Longmire-Avital and her research collaborators, Ja’Nina Walker, assistant professor at the University of San Francisco, and Sarit Golub, associate professor at Hunter College, City University of New York, found that for black gay and bisexual emerging adults (ages 18 – 25), higher self-reported racial centrality (the degree to which being black is central to your overall identity) and racial public regard (perceptions of societal views towards black Americans) predicted decreases in sexual risk behaviors.
Sexual identity factors were related to racial identity factors at bivariate levels but did not predict changes in sexual risk behaviors when considered in a hierarchical linear regression. The authors suggest that effective comprehensive interventions with emerging adults who are both sexual and racial minorities should integrate racial identity into health and prevention models. Additional findings indicate that whether or not the emerging adult was “out” related to their sexual risk. The emerging adults of this sample that had not told their primary social networks (i.e., family and friends) that they were gay or bisexual engaged in lower risk behaviors. The authors discuss potential factors contributing to this and the primary findings in the study.
The article, “Racial and Sexual Identities as Potential Buffers to Risky Sexual Behavior for Black Gay and Bisexual Emerging Adult Men,” appears in the December 2014 issue of Health Psychology, a highly selective American Psychological Association journal.