Social Relationship Attitudes of Student-athletes toward Heterosexual, Gay, and Lesbian Peers in Taiwan

Te-Sheng Chang *

Department of Education and Human Potential Development, National Dong Hwa University, Taiwan.

Wei-Ting Hsu

Center of General Education, Fo-Guang University, Taiwan.

Tsai-Wei Wang

Department of Education and Human Potential Development, National Dong Hwa University, Taiwan.

*Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.


Abstract

This study investigated Taiwanese student-athletes’ social relationship attitudes toward heterosexual, gay, and lesbian peers in Taiwan. Participants were 192 male and 156 female heterosexual student-athletes from a sports university in Taiwan. The Social Relationship Attitudes toward Heterosexual/Gay/Lesbian Peers scales were used to measure participants’ attitudes toward their peers with different sexual orientations. The results indicate that Taiwanese heterosexual student–athletes’ social relationship attitudes toward peers are dependent on both student gender and the sexual orientation of the target. Male student-athletes’ social relationship attitudes toward gays and lesbians are more negative compared to female student-athletes across personal, societal, and moral domains. Both male and female student-athletes’ social relationship attitudes toward gays are more negative compared to their attitudes toward lesbians in the personal and societal domains. Male student-athletes indicate lower sympathy scores for gays than for lesbians. Females show no difference in their sympathy scores for peers with different sexual orientations.

Keywords: Gays, lesbians, social relationship attitudes, student-athletes in Taiwan.


How to Cite

Chang, Te-Sheng, Wei-Ting Hsu, and Tsai-Wei Wang. 2016. “Social Relationship Attitudes of Student-Athletes Toward Heterosexual, Gay, and Lesbian Peers in Taiwan”. Journal of Education, Society and Behavioural Science 16 (3):1-11. https://doi.org/10.9734/BJESBS/2016/26239.