Attitudes of Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans toward gay and lesbian service members

Armed Forces and Society

Volumn 36, Issue 3, 2010, Pages 397-419

  Moradi, Bonnie ^a   Miller, Laura ^b  

^a UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA   (United States)

^b RAND CORPORATION   (United States)

Author keywords

Don't ask; Don't tell; Gay; Lesbian; Military cohesion; Military readiness; Sexual orientation

Indexed keywords

EID: 77949619833     PISSN: 0095327X     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1177/0095327X09352960     Document Type: Article

References (64)

1. For histories of U.S. military policies and practices in this area, see Allan Bérubé, Coming Out Under Fire: The History of Gay Men and Women in World War Two (New York: Plume, 1990).
2. Randy Shilts, Conduct Unbecoming: Gays & Lesbians in the U.S. Military (New York: St. Martin's, 1993).
3. and Melissa Sheridan Embser-Herbert, ed., The U.S. Military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" Policy (Westport, CT: Praeger, 2007).
4. Eric Schmitt, "Military Cites Wide Range of Reasons for Its Gay Ban," New York Times, January 27, 1993.
5. Office of the Secretary of Defense, "Memorandum on Policy on Homosexual Conduct in the Armed Forces" (1993), http://www.qrd.org/qrd/usa/military/1993/Aspin.Directive.On.Ban (accessed May 1, 2007).
6. As part of its effort to dissociate same-sex sexual orientation from its prior pathologized status, the American Psychological Association recommends use of the terms lesbian and gay rather than the term homosexual when referring to individuals or groups of people.
7. See Committee on Lesbian and Gay Concerns, American Psychological Association, "Avoiding Heterosexual Bias in Language," American Psychologist 46 (1991): 973-74.
8. Office of the Secretary of Defense, "Memorandum."
9. Select demographic data on the armed forces are routinely posted by the Defense Equal Opportunity Management Institute on its Web site, http://www.deomi.org/EOEEOResources/ DemographicReports.cfm.
10. For more in-depth discussions of the literature on the role of cohesion in military operations, see James Griffith, "Multilevel Analysis of Cohesion's Relation to Stress, Well-Being, Identification, Disintegration, and Perceived Combat Readiness," Military Psychology 14 (2002): 217-39.
11. James Griffith and Mark Vaitkus, "Relating Cohesion to Stress, Strain, Disintegration, and Performance: An Organizing Framework," Military Psychology 11 (1999): 27-55.
12. Robert J. MacCoun, "Sexual Orientation and Military Cohesion: A Critical Review of the Evidence," in Out in Force: Sexual Orientation and the Military, ed. Gregory M. Herek, Jared B. Jobe, and Ralph M. Carney (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996), 157-76.
13. Robert J. MacCoun, Elizabeth Kier, and Aaron Belkin, "Does Social Cohesion Determine Motivation in Combat? An Old Question with an Old Answer," Armed Forces & Society 32 (2006): 646-54.
14. Guy L. Siebold, "Small Unit Dynamics: Leadership, Cohesion, Motivation, and Morale," in Reserve Component Soldiers as Peacekeepers, ed. Ruth. H. Phelps and Beatrice J. Farr (Alexandria, VA: U.S. Army Research Institute for the Behavioral and Social Sciences, 1996).
15. Guy L. Siebold, "The Essence of Military Group Cohesion," Armed Forces & Society 33 (2007): 286-95.
16. Guy L. Siebold and Twila J. Lindsay, "The Relation between Demographic Descriptors and Soldier-Perceived Cohesion and Motivation," Military Psychology 11 (2000): 109-28.
17. Guy L. Siebold, "The Evolution of the Measurement of Cohesion," Military Psychology 11 (1999): 5-26.
18. Guy L. Siebold, "Military Group Cohesion," in Military Life: The Psychology of Serving in Peace and Combat, vol. 1, ed. Thomas W. Britt, Amy B. Adler, and Carl Andrew Castro (Westport, CT: Praeger, 2005), 185-201.
19. Rhonda Evans, "U.S. Military Policies Concerning Homosexuals: Development, Implementation and Outcomes" (white paper, University of California, Santa Barbara, Palm Center, 2001).
20. Service Members Legal Defense Network, "Fact Sheets: Total 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' Discharges 1994-2006," http://www.sldn.org/pages/about-dont-ask-dont-tell-fact-sheets (accessed October 12, 2009).
21. Bryan Bender, "Stepped-up Army Recruiting Enlists Many with Problems," Boston Globe, November 27, 2007.
22. Aamer Madhani, "Army Defends Standards for Recruits," Chicago Tribune, October 11, 2007.
23. U.S. Government Accountability Office, "Military Personnel: Financial Costs and Loss of Critical Skills Due to DOD's Homosexual Conduct Policy Cannot Be Completely Estimated" (2005), http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d05299.pdf (accessed April 25, 2007).
24. For a discussion of the expulsion of Arab linguists because of their sexual orientation, see Nathaniel Frank, Unfriendly Fire: How the Gay Ban Undermines the Military and Weakens America (New York: St. Martin's, 2009).
25. For more details on the lifting of bans in those nations, see Aaron Belkin and Melissa Sheridan Embser-Herbert, "The International Experience," in U.S. Military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" Policy, 59-80.
26. Social and cultural influences that might explain the variation in policies among nations are discussed in Yagil Levy, "The Right to Fight: A Conceptual Framework for the Analysis of Recruitment Policy toward Gays and Lesbians," Armed Forces & Society 33 (2007): 186-202.
27. Belkin and Embser-Herbert, "International Experience," 59-80.
28. National Defense Research Institute, Sexual Orientation and U.S. Military Personnel Policy: Options and Assessment (Santa Monica, CA: RAND, 1993).
29. Aaron Belkin and Melissa Levitt, "Homosexuality and the Israel Defense Forces: Did Lifting the Gay Ban Undermine Military Performance?" Armed Forces & Society 27 (2001): 541-65.
30. Laura Miller, "Fighting for a Just Cause: Soldiers' Attitudes on Gays in the Military," in Gays and Lesbians in the Military: Issues, Concerns, and Contrasts, ed. W. J. Scott and S. Carson Stanley (New York: Aldine, 1994), 69-85.
31. National Defense Research Institute, Sexual Orientation.
32. Armando X. Estrada, "Attitudes of Military Personnel toward Homosexuals," Journal of Homosexuality 37 (1999): 83-97.
33. John W. Bicknell, Jr., "Study of Naval Officers' Attitudes toward Homosexuals in the Military" (master's thesis, Naval Postgraduate School, 2000).
34. Laura Miller and John Allen Williams, "Do Military Policies on Gender and Sexuality Undermine Combat Effectiveness?" in Soldiers and Civilians: The U.S. Military, American Society, and National Security, ed. P. Feaver and R. Kohn (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2001), 361-402.
35. Embser-Herbert, U.S. Military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" Policy.
36. Aaron Belkin, "'Don't Ask, Don't Tell': Does the Gay Ban Undermine the Military's Reputation?" Armed Forces & Society 34 (January 2008): 276-91.
37. Annenberg Public Policy Center, NAES 04, National Annenberg Election Survey, press release (Washington, DC: Annenberg Public Policy Center, October 16, 2004).
38. John Zogby, John Bruce, Rebecca Whittman, and Sam Rodgers, Opinions of Military Personnel on Sexual Minorities in the Military (New York: Zogby International, December 2006).
39. Louis Bonilla and Judith Porter, "A Comparison of Latino, Black, and Non-Hispanic White Attitudes toward Homosexuality," Hispanic Journal of Behavioral Sciences 12 (1990): 437-52.
40. Gregory Herek and Eric Glunt, "Interpersonal Contact and Heterosexuals' Attitudes toward Gay Men: Results from a National Survey," Journal of Sex Research 30 (1993): 239-44.
41. John G. Kerns and Mark A. Fine, "The Relation between Gender and Negative Attitudes toward Gay Men and Lesbians: Do Gender Role Attitudes Mediate This Relation?" Sex Roles 31 (1994): 297-307.
42. Mary E. Kite and Bernard E. Whitley, Jr., "Do Heterosexual Women and Men Differ in Their Attitudes towards Homosexuality? A Conceptual and Methodological Analysis," in Stigma and Sexual Orientation: Understanding Prejudice Against Lesbians, Gay Men, and Bisexuals, ed. Gregory M. Herek (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 1998), 39-61.
43. Lisa LaMar and Mary E. Kite, "Sex Differences in Attitudes toward Lesbians and Gay Men: A Multidimensional Perspective," Journal of Sex Research 35 (1998): 189-96.
44. Robert D. Schope and Michele J. Eliason, "Thinking versus Acting: Assessing the Relationship between Heterosexual Attitudes and Behaviors towards Homosexuals," Journal of Gay & Lesbian Social Services 11 (2000): 69-92.
45. Bernard E. Whitley, Jr. and Sarah E. Lee, "The Relationship of Authoritarianism and Related Constructs to Attitudes toward Homosexuality," Journal of Applied Social Psychology 30 (2006): 144-70.
46. Gregory M. Herek, "Why Tell If You're Not Asked? Self-Disclosure, Intergroup Contact, and Heterosexuals' Attitudes toward Lesbians and Gay Men," in Out in Force, 197-225.
47. Herek and Glunt, "Interpersonal Contact."
48. Miller, "Fighting for a Just Cause".
49. Estrada, "Attitudes of Military Personnel".
50. Bicknell, "Study of Naval Officers' Attitudes".
51. Miller and Williams, "Do Military Policies on Gender and Sexuality Undermine Combat Effectiveness?".
52. Belkin, "'Don't Ask, Don't Tell'".
53. Bonnie Moradi, "Perceived Sexual Orientation-Based Harassment in Military and Civilian Contexts," Military Psychology 18 (2006): 39-60.
54. Department of Defense, Office of the Inspector General, "Military Environment with Respect to the Homosexual Conduct Policy," Report D-2000-101 (Washington, DC: Department of Defense, 2000).
55. We cannot directly interpret the meaning of the third of the sample who selected the "neutral" option: they might not care about the issue either way, they might be unable to decide, or they might not feel they know enough about the issue to make a decision.
56. Alpha for these analyses was adjusted to.005 (.05/12) to control for Type I error. Tukey's honestly significant difference follow-up comparisons were used to evaluate group differences underlying significant main effects. In the case of political party, the Games-Howell (GH) follow-up comparison was used because Levene's test of equality of error variances was significant, indicating unequal error variances across groups for this variable.
57. Kerns and Fine, "Relation between Gender and Negative Attitudes".
58. Kite and Whitley, "Do Heterosexual Women and Men Differ in Their Attitudes towards Homosexuality?".
59. LaMar and Kite, "Sex Differences".
60. Schope and Eliason, "Thinking versus Acting."
61. 2, which is an indicator of the unique variance accounted for by a factor, while partialling out other factors included in the equation from the total nonerror variance.
62. Charles A. Pierce, Richard A. Block, and Herman Aguinis, "Cautionary Note on Reporting Eta-Squared Values from Multifactor ANOVA Designs," Educational and Psychological Measurement 64 (2004): 916-24.
63. Charles Moskos, Jr., "From Citizen's Army to Social Laboratory," in Gays and Lesbians in the Military, 64.
64. Alpha for these tests was adjusted to.02 (.05/4) to control for Type I error. The GH followup comparison was used for comfort with gay and lesbian persons and for personal knowledge of gay and lesbian unit members because Levene's test of equality of error variances indicated unequal error variances across groups for these two variables.