UT Study on Gay Parenting Sparks Controversy
A new study from UT sociologist Mark Regnerus is making huge waves today in the worlds of social science and LGBT politics. The study’s title asks “How different are the adult children of parents who have same-sex relationships?” The answer, according to Regnerus, is a resounding “very different.”
Regnerus surveyed adult children who reported their mother had at least one same-sex relationship. His surveys found that those children fared worse on 25 of 40 outcomes: they reported worse physical and mental health, more difficulty with romantic relationships, and lower incomes than did children of married heterosexual parents.
But that doesn’t mean that the children did worse because of their parents’ sexual orientation, Regnerus stresses. “This was not a causative study,” he says. Though the study found a link between gay parents and worse outcomes, it didn’t demonstrate that gay parents are less effective than straight parents. Any number of other reasons could account for the differences—maybe children of gay parents suffered from discrimination, for example, or were impacted by financial insecurity.
“The study set out to answer one question and one question only,” says LBJ School professor Cynthia Osborne, who authored a response to the study. “Causality wasn’t part of it. When you have such a highly politicized topic, you need to be very clear about what the research says and doesn’t say. And people will try to make it say whatever they want.”
Osborne says that the study reveals more about family structure than about the parenting ability of gay people. “Based on prior research, when we compare kids raised by their married biological parents to kids who grow up in any other kind of family form—blended families, step-parents, adoptive families, single parents, and so on—the married bio kids are advantaged,” Osborne says. “What hasn’t been tested within any of those family forms is whether parental sexual orientation matters.”
Until now, Osborne says, studies of gay families have found a “protective effect”—that is, gay families weren’t negatively impacted by unconventional family structures, even though straight families were. Regnerus’ study didn’t find evidence of a protective effect.
Critics like Slate‘s Willian Saletan say that the exclusion of stable, planned, long-term same-sex families from the study is misleading. After all, those are the kinds of families who are rallying for the legalization of same-sex marriage and adoption.
Osborne says she completely agrees: “It’s an apples-to-oranges comparison—Mark didn’t answer the question that many of us want to see answered,” she explains. “That is, if you have two children growing up in stable married households, and all is equal except parental sexual orientation, is there a difference? That’s the comparison we are legislating today, but it’s a very hard comparison to make.”
One reason that the comparison is so hard to make, Osborne explains, is that 20 to 30 years ago, when the subjects of the study were growing up, there were very few stable, planned, same-sex families in the United States, and none that were married—it was culturally near-impossible. Many of the study’s subjects had experienced divorce, putting them at a disadvantage. Today, that’s rapidly changing—meaning future research may be more revealing.
“The next step is to replicate these findings and ask the question of why these differences exist,” says Osborne. “This was just the first step.”
Photo via Flickr Creative Commons.
Share this article
![UT Grad Student Films Austin After Dark [Watch]](http://alcalde.texasexes.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/SleepwalkingAustin1.jpg){kind=small}
![Did This Alum Write the Great American Novel? [Podcast]](http://alcalde.texasexes.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/meyercover.jpg){kind=small}
-
pat white: A grandmother of Nine and a retired teacher of 41 years, I want to applaud Nate ...
-
Julie Osterberg Sather: Vince DiNino came to Alexandria, MN to be our band director. I was blessed to le...
-
Carl Schock: This legislation was needed. My suspicion is that many Texas Exes have consisten...
-
Virginia: 76-37-5 !!!! Who cares How BEVO got the name.....UT will always have the fame. ...
-
Rick Cherwitz: Predictable but sad! The Texas Coalition for Excellence in Higher Education put...
14 Comments
Of course it’s making waves, it compared apples to oranges. He didn’t compare single gay parents to single straight parents, or a gay couple raising children to a straight couple raising children. He compared a group of gay parents, the majority of whom seem to single parents, to two parent straight families. All studies already show the results of single parenting are not as good, but studies also show two parents, no matter their gender, do much better.
If they don’t want their study to be highly politicized then maybe they shouln’t have taken money from groups closely associated with the anti-gay National Organization for (sic) Marriage.
[...] Positive Portrayal of “Gay” ParentingThe New AmericanSlate Magazine -BuzzFeed -The Alcaldeall 59 news [...]
I have to give props to whoever wrote this article. So far from what I have read it gives the best description of what this research ISN’T.
I questioned Dr. Regnerus about why he did not separate out the Respondents who were raised in a straight up lesbian home or a straight up gay home and his answer is that he could not find any, of the few he did find, he just threw them in the pot with the Respondents who were raised in a Mixed Orientation Marriage (MOM). A MOM is where one spouse is gay and one spouse is straight. Principally a marriage of gays who are in the closet and/or in denial of their homosexuality, so they marry straight. That is who reponded to this survey people who had parents in a MOM. And Dr. Regnerus confirms that he found only a few Respondents who were raised in a straight up lesbian or straight up gay home. Here is part of his e-mail to me which he asked me to post.
“By the way, one of the key methodological criticisms circulating is that–basically–in a population-based sample, I haven’t really evaluated how the adult children of stably-intact coupled self-identified lesbians have fared. Right? Right. And I’m telling you that it cannot be feasibly accomplished. It is a methodological (practical) impossibility at present, for reasons I describe: they really didn’t exist in numbers that could be amply obtained *randomly*. It may well be a flaw–limitation, I think–but it is unavoidable. We maxxed Knowledge Networks’ ability, and no firm is positioned to do better. It would have cost untold millions of dollars, and still may not generate the number of cases needed for statistical analyses. If randomness wasn’t the key priority, then we could’ve done it. And we’d have had a nonrandom sample that was no better than anything before it. So, while critics are taking potshots, they should remember that there’s a (low) ceiling to what’s possible here. My team of consultants elected to go with the screener questions (including the one about same-sex relationships) that we did, anticipating–accurately, too–that there would be no way of generating ample sample size if we narrowed the criteria (for who counts as a lesbian parent) to the sort that critics are calling for. We figured that, with the household roster/calendar offering the opportunity to identify who you lived with, we’d comfortably get enough cases wherein the respondent reported living with mom and her partner for many consecutive years. But few did. ”
See he could not find but a couple people who were raised in a straight up lesbian or straight up gay homes, he says that himself. He surveyed people raised in a MIXED ORIENTATION MARRIAGE (OR A MIXED ORIENTATION SEXUAL RELATIONSHIP)
You can read the full e-mail exchange between myself and Dr. Regnerus on Box Turtle which broke this story.
FWIW I agree with Dr. Regnerus Mixed Orientation Marriages (or Mixed Orientation Sexual Relationships) that produce children are VERY BAD for the children. And that is what his study proves. It does not attempt and does NOT assess the outcomes of children raised by 2 loving moms or 2 loving dads. It.Does.Not.
http://www.boxturtlebulletin.com/2012/06/11/45557
http://www.boxturtlebulletin.com/2012/06/10/45512
The Best Synopsis of this research can be found here THANK YOU ROB TISINAI this cartoon summarizes this research completely. Everyone Please view and re-post
http://wakingupnow.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/201…
My Final link did not go through. Here is is again. This summarizes the research in one simple cartoon.
http://wakingupnow.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/quit-damning5.png
I FEEL IF OUR COUNTRY WOULD JUST GO TO ALL SAME SEX MARRIAGES, THE POPULATION EXPLOSION, WOULD BE UNDER CONTROL IN JUST A COUPLE OF GENERATIONS.,., I MUST SUPPORT SAME SEX MARRIAGE, AS I HAVE BEEN HAVING THE SAME SEX WITH MY (FEMALE) WIFE FOR 29 YEARS.,., SMILE ~
I’m excited about what this research does say — that all 5 of my biological children, who have been raised by me and my husband of almost 26 years, are “advantaged.”
As an educator, I see the same results. Students who live with their married, biological parents excel emotionally, socially, and academically.
Glad to see some supporting evidence of what I have experienced and seen in my classrooms for years. Too bad the information in this study has sparked so many “sidebar” discussions that folks are now missing the entire point of the study.
How about kids who are not fortunate enough to have any responsible, willing biological parents anymore? You’re basically just saying that all adopted kids are worse off. Nice work removing the stigma of adoption.
It looks like Kathy is rephrasing what the article above says. Not sure this is a place to argue about “stigma.”
“The married bio kids are advantaged…” says the article. Not that initial advantage in life is the end-all, be-all.
I took Sociology with Dr. Regnerus my sophomore year at UT. He focused on child sexuality and religion, which right off the bat drew my suspicion since he didn’t teach a broad intro to sociology, but rather presented his own research. He has done comprehensive studies before on the subjects of childhood religion and sexuality, and the conclusions seemed to be painted to imply that sex at a young age is immoral and that kids who act this way aren’t religious. I remember him showing a picture illustrating teenage couples and how they often share past partners. It was his presentation of this as a negative that made me distrust him. I’m not saying he’s wrong, but I didn’t feel like I was learning sociology, I felt I was being told not to have sex so much. He is a religious young man with a large conservative family. This study was funded by “the conservative Witherspoon Institute and the Bradley Foundation.” (Statesman) I distrust this research because of Dr. Regnerus’ past studies “proving” conservative ideals, and my personal experience of his bizarre faux-Sociology class.
Yes, his work definitely shouldn’t be taken seriously. Thank goodness there aren’t any liberal sociology professors receiving funding from like-minded organizations and indoctrinating students into their own biased research.
when your research is funded by one political “side” and you somehow always end up supporting that side, skepticism is warranted. thank you for your sarcasm, but this is true for both political leanings, and neither side is right. the “they do it, too” argument is meaningless – it’s wrong regardless and it invalidates this research in my eyes
NOM Shill Mark Regnerus’ Long History Of Using Religion To Attack Gays
http://thenewcivilrightsmovement.com/opinion-nom-shill-mark-regnerus-long-history-of-using-religion-to-attack-gays/discrimination/2012/06/14/41465
ow Anti-Gay Regnerus ‘Study’ Was Corrupted By NOM From Beginning To End
http://thenewcivilrightsmovement.com/opinion-how-anti-gay-regnerus-study-was-corrupted-by-nom-from-beginning-to-end/marriage/2012/06/13/41324
Reality bites! Of course kids are not going to turn out as well adjusted when raised by gay parents, duh! A four-year-old could figure that out. Gays who support studies that say otherwise are far more biased than any conservative because they have far more to lose by accepting basic common sense. Figures lie and liars figure.
Hear it is from the horses mouth.
http://www.crisismagazine.com/2012/growing-up-with-two-moms-the-untold-childrens-view