IMPACT Program researchers received the award for Best Senior Investigator Poster at the annual meeting of the International Academy of Sex Researchers (IASR).  Authors of the poster included Mustanski, Newcomb, Heinz, Birkett, and Ashbeck.  The poster was titled, “Sex Differences in Developmental Trajectories of Sexual Attractions Among LGBT Youth.”  The data for the poster came from Project Q2, a longitudinal study of 250 LGBT youth who have been followed over 2.5 years.  The poster reported similarities and differences based on birth sex and sexual orientation label (bisexual versus gay/lesbian) in sexual attractions across development.

A new study published in the prestigious journal Pediatrics followed a group of children born to lesbian mothers for nearly 25 years to chart their psychological health and development. Previous studies have found no significant differences in psychological health between children reared by lesbian or heterosexual parents [1-4]. This led the American Academy of Pediatrics to issue a report in support of same-sex parents raising children [5].

This new study, by Dr. Gartell and Dr. Bos, was launched in 1986 with a goal of following children of planned lesbian families into adulthood. They described the families as “planned” because the children were conceived with donor insemination opposed to being conceived with a man from a previous relationship. After nearly 25 years, the authors have reported the results on the psychological adjustment of the offspring. They measures psychological adjustment with the widely used and validated … Read More »

Researchers published findings from the largest nationally representative study of sexual and sexual-health behaviors ever conducted. Called the National Survey of Sexual Health and Behavior (NSSHB), it is one of the most comprehensive studies on sexuality in almost two decades and documents the sexual experiences and condom-use behaviors of 5,865 adolescents and adults ages 14 to 94. It was conducted by my colleagues Dr. Michael Reece, Dr. Debby Herbenick, Dr. Brian Dodge, and their colleagues at Indiana University. Initial findings from the survey, presented in nine separate research articles, were published on Oct. 1 in a special issue of The Journal of Sexual Medicine.