Category: LGBTQ+
Nathan Hollinsaid, B.S. (he/him/his)
Clinical Science Doctoral Student
Department of Psychology, Harvard University
Cambridge, Massachusetts
Rachel Martino, B.S. (she/her/hers)
Harvard University
Cambridge, Massachusetts
Mark Hatzenbuehler, Ph.D. (he/him/his)
John L Loeb Associate Professor of the Social Sciences
Harvard University
Cambridge, Massachusetts
Nathan Hollinsaid, B.S. (he/him/his)
Clinical Science Doctoral Student
Department of Psychology, Harvard University
Cambridge, Massachusetts
Rachel Martino, B.S. (she/her/hers)
Harvard University
Cambridge, Massachusetts
Michael Pellicane, M.A. (he/him/his)
Doctoral Candidate in Clinical Psychology
Kent State University
Kent, Ohio
Julian Burger, M.S. (he/him/his)
postdoctoral researcher
Yale University
Amsterdam, Noord-Holland, Netherlands
Consistent with foundational theories of minority stress (e.g., Meyer, 2003), research consistently demonstrates that sexual minorities’ stigma experiences contribute to difficulties in expressing, processing, and regulating emotions (Hatzenbuehler et al., 2009). Although the use of particular emotion regulation strategies (e.g., suppression) may represent a positive adaptation to hostile social contexts or climates among sexual minorities, chronic engagement in these processes has been linked to this group’s inequitable risk for mental and behavioral health morbidity (e.g., Hatzenbuehler et al., 2008). Accordingly, sexual minorities may stand to benefit considerably from cognitive-behavioral and other interventions designed to enhance emotion expression and regulation and to decrease ruminative focus on affective states (Pachankis et al., 2022), especially when persistently exposed to stigmatizing social situations or environments. On one hand, intervention science is needed to test whether these treatments effectively address specific affective processes (e.g., rumination), and whether they are more (vs. less) efficacious when and where stigmatization is high. On the other, affective science is needed to identify the most potent targets of such interventions.
In pursuit of these priorities, our symposium features four studies with sexual minority samples conducted by leading intervention and affective scientists across career stages. Drawing on recent randomized controlled trials, the first of two intervention studies identifies rumination (but not other emotion processes) as an important mediating mechanism of a cognitive-behavioral intervention adapted for young sexual minority men; the second reveals the promising benefits of even a brief, non-adapted emotion-focused intervention for sexual minority adolescents exposed to high levels of structural stigma. Two remaining studies apply innovative measurement approaches to link sexual minorities’ stigma experiences to internalizing symptoms via understudied affective processes, including emotion intensity and the affective content and valence of rumination. Together, study findings highlight the considerable promise of interventions addressing sexual minorities’ emotion-related experiences, yet they also suggest a need to broaden treatment targets to include a wider range of emotion processes.
Following these talks, our discussant will draw on their substantial experience as a pioneering stigma researcher and interventionist to discuss new avenues for enhancing intervention efficacy for sexual minorities and other stigmatized populations by more explicitly addressing emotion regulation. Future directions will include: (1) leveraging advances in affective science to maximize the benefits of cognitive-behavioral therapies adapted for the stigmatized; (2) ensuring that treatment gains in emotion regulation abilities confer health benefits among these groups; and (3) examining stigma as potential source of treatment-effect heterogeneity predicting where (e.g., in higher-stigma environments) and for whom (e.g., among those exposed to more frequent stigma experiences) emotion-focused interventions are most impactful.
