ABSTRACT

Once ignored by the popular media, sexual and gender minority (SGM) characters have become increasingly visible in recent decades. According to the parasocial contact hypothesis, favorable media portrayals of minority communities can reduce prejudicial attitudes, especially among audience members who have limited real-life relationships with minorities. To explore the boundaries of this hypothesis, we designed an experimental vignette study in which we randomly exposed participants to an unfavorable portrayal of SGM characters, the Bury Your Gays (BYG) trope, which involves SGM characters (typically lesbians and bisexual women) dying in violent ways. Findings indicated that, among the women in the sample, exposure to the trope was associated with more favorable attitudes toward SGM individuals and less sexist attitudes. This effect was especially pronounced among women with SGM friends. We argue that these surprising findings have the potential to broaden the scope of the social contact hypothesis by suggesting a variety of portrayals of minority characters may produce favorable attitudes toward minority groups. Future research should seek to refine the parameters of this hypothesis by exploring effects of a range of portrayals of SGM characters on attitudes among individuals with various types of relationships with SGM individuals.

摘要

曾经被大众媒体忽视的性和性别少数（SGM）角色在近几十年来变得越来越明显。根据准社会接触假说，媒体对少数群体的有利描述可以减少偏见态度，尤其是在现实生活中与少数群体关系有限的观众中。为了探索这一假设的界限，我们设计了一个实验性的小插曲研究，在该研究中，我们随机让参与者接触到对 SGM 角色的不利描述，即埋葬你的同性恋 (BYG) 比喻，其中涉及 SGM 角色（通常是女同性恋和双性恋女性）死于暴力的方式。研究结果表明，在样本中的女性中，接触这种比喻与对 SGM 个体更有利的态度和更少的性别歧视态度有关。这种影响在有 SGM 朋友的女性中尤为明显。我们认为，这些令人惊讶的发现有可能扩大社会接触假设的范围，因为它们表明对少数群体角色的各种描绘可能会产生对少数群体的有利态度。未来的研究应该通过探索一系列 SGM 人物描绘对与 SGM 个体有各种关系的个人态度的影响来寻求改进这一假设的参数。