Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Psychologies

Peel, Elizabeth and Riggs, D.W. (2016) Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Psychologies. In: The Wiley Blackwell Encyclopedia of Gender and Sexuality Studies. Wiley Blackwell, Chichester, pp. 1-6. ISBN Print: 9781405196949 Online: 9781118663219

Abstract

Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) psychology is the current term used to refer to what was previously known as the affirmative field of lesbian and gay psychology, which developed from the late 1960s onwards. This field of psychology is closely aligned to the psychology of sexualities, but with a specific focus on non-heterosexual and/or non-gender normative people. The term LGBT psychology signals a more unitary field than LGBT psychologies, the latter highlighting a multiplicity of psychological perspectives and also discrete bodies of psychological knowledge that focus on either lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender identities and topics. The epistemological frameworks and research methods utilized within the field of LGBT psychology differ between countries. In North America (and particularly the United States), positivist empiricism informed by liberal humanism is the dominant framework in this field (as with psychological research more generally). In Europe and in Australasia, by contrast, LGBT psychological research is commonly more aligned with post-positivist and critical psychological traditions such as social constructionism.

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