Background to the Research

• Although recent hate crime and equality legislation have contributed to an improvement in the status of same-sex relationships in NI, figures on hate crime towards same-sex attracted people in NI have actually increased since the hate-crime law was passed.
• Heterosexism in NI is perpetuated through the education system - the Catholic Church and Protestant churches exert strong influences on the governance and curriculum of schools, with consequences on if and how sex education has been provided.
  

Research Approach

• Beginning with a literature review on the area of homophobic bullying and homophobia and mental health, this article was based on a large random sample of 16 year olds in NI. Via postal questionnaire, the 2005 YLT survey sought to ascertain the number of young people reporting same-sex attraction. The GHQ12 was also employed. Of particular interest for this article was the extent to which same-sex attraction is associated with school bullying and mental health.
  

Main Findings

Literature review

• Homophobic bullying is more severe in nature than bullying in general and causes mental distress for many LGB people. It occurs in secondary schools, with many teachers aware of its existence. Homophobic pejoratives are the most predominant category of abusive language among young adolescents
• Research has revealed an association between bullying and various mental health problems, including depression and self-harm.
• Homophobia has been shown to increase various risk factors associated with psychological, psychosocial, psychiatric, social and health problems.
• In a NI-wide study of LGBT young people, a majority of respondents had experienced homophobic attitudes from family members; many felt compelled to leave the family home as a result. Other outcomes included attempted suicide, depression and being bullied at school.
• Research carried out by the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission recognised the link between emotional problems and homophobia, while a study of sexual attitudes and lifestyles of young people in NI found that same-sex-attracted respondents were less likely to report a close personal relationship with their parents, less likely to be able to discuss personal or sexual matters with them and less likely to have received relevant sex information at home. .
  

Results from the YLT survey

• 8.8% of all respondents said they had been attracted to someone of the same sex as themselves at least once.
• Of those who responded to a question on bullying (n=803), 30.4% said they had been bullied in school at some time - of these, 27.7% said they had been bullied either 'a little' or 'a lot' in the past two months.
• 47.1% of same/both-sex-attracted respondents said that they had been bullied compared with just 28.2% of opposite-sex-attracted respondents; this difference was much greater among males than females.
• 68.8% of respondents said that their school had particular staff to deal with bullying, and 56.3% thought that their school provided real help with regard to bullying. Same/both-sex-attracted respondents were significantly less likely to say that their schools provided such help.
• 21.4% of respondents had a score of 4 or more on the GHQ12, meaning they have higher levels of psychiatric disorder than those with a score of 3 and under. Same-sex-attracted respondents were more than twice as likely to be 'cases' as opposite-sex-attracted respondents; this was particularly marked among young men.
• Same/both-sex-attracted respondents were much more likely to say that they experienced pressures to engage in behaviour that can be adverse to their general and mental health, including drinking alcohol, losing weight, taking drugs and having sexual intercourse.
• Same/both-sex-attracted respondents scored significantly higher on a scale of combined social pressures than opposite-sex-attracted respondents.
• The source of social pressures most often identified by respondents was friends for alcohol, smoking, illegal drugs and sexual intercourse, but the media for losing weight. The majority of same/both-sex-attracted respondents experienced social pressure to engage in sexual intercourse from peers but not friends, whereas the majority of opposite-sex-attracted respondents cited this pressure from friends.
• 57.1% of same-sex-attracted respondents, compared with 33.8% of opposite-sex-attracted respondents said they would leave NI. Same/both-sex-attracted respondents were significantly more likely to say they would leave to seek a better future in general and were also significantly more likely to say they would not come back to NI.

Conclusions

• The findings indicate that, as predicted, same-sex-attracted respondents were significantly more likely to have poor mental health and to say they had been bullied at school. They were also more likely to experience higher levels of social pressure to engage in certain behaviours.
• The findings related to leaving NI suggest that NI remains a hostile society to non-heterosexual young people.
• The authors report that the findings as supportive of other research.
• That same-sex respondents were significantly more likely to experience social pressures to conform to certain behaviours suggests that they are a particularly vulnerable group.