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ABSTRACT: Background
Daily stress plays a significant role in mental and physical health. Negative mood (e.g., hopelessness) and physical symptoms (e.g., headaches) are responses often associated with daily stressors. It is theorized that some people or populations are more vulnerable or reactive to daily stressors. We propose sexual orientation as one factor that is associated with daily stress exposure and reactivity.Purpose
To understand whether sexual minorities (SMs) differ from heterosexuals in their exposure and reactivity to general, non-sexual minority-specific stressors (e.g., arguments/disagreements, job concerns).Methods
We used daily diary data (n = 3,323 heterosexuals [52% identified as female and 85% identified as White]; n = 98 SMs [50% identified as female and 93% identified as White]) from the National Study of Daily Experiences (NSDE). Participants completed eight consecutive evening daily diary interviews (n days = 24,773; mean days completed = 7.24) and reported daily stress exposure and daily well-being. We used multilevel modeling as an approach to examine whether sexual orientation interacted with daily stressors to predict daily negative affect and physical health.Results
SMs tended to experience more daily stressors compared to heterosexuals; specifically, SMs reported at least one stressor on nearly half (48%) of the study days they completed, and heterosexuals reported at least one stressor on about two-fifths (41%) of the study days they completed. SMs also tended to experience more negative mood when they experienced a daily stressor compared to heterosexuals when they experienced a daily stressor.Conclusion
We emphasize the importance of SMs' exposure and reactivity to general daily stressors and the implications of our results for the day-to-day lives and health of SMs.
SUBMITTER: Wardecker BM
PROVIDER: S-EPMC9242545 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Jun
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
Wardecker Britney M BM Surachman Agus A Matsick Jes L JL Almeida David M DM
Annals of behavioral medicine : a publication of the Society of Behavioral Medicine 20220601 6
<h4>Background</h4>Daily stress plays a significant role in mental and physical health. Negative mood (e.g., hopelessness) and physical symptoms (e.g., headaches) are responses often associated with daily stressors. It is theorized that some people or populations are more vulnerable or reactive to daily stressors. We propose sexual orientation as one factor that is associated with daily stress exposure and reactivity.<h4>Purpose</h4>To understand whether sexual minorities (SMs) differ from heter ...[more]