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The present study investigated school climate and family acceptance as two factors for reducing the minority stress that predicts sexual minority adolescents’ mental health broadly, and specifically in each environment. The current study investigated two analog mediational models examining the pathways of school climate and family acceptance on global life satisfaction (Model 1) and the subdomains of family and school satisfaction (Model 2), through minority stress. Based on reports from a sample of 293 sexual minority adolescents in the United States, results showed minority stress partially mediated the relationship between school climate and family acceptance on global life satisfaction (p < 0.001), sharing a direct effect with school climate (p = 0.006). School climate stood out as the stronger and more consistent predictor of global, family, and school satisfaction. These results suggest that addressing minority stress in schools through various levels of intervention could influence life satisfaction overall, in school, and at home by reducing minority stress. Limitations and potential implications for practice are discussed within a multitiered mental health service delivery framework in schools.
Opmerkingen
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More young people in the United States (U.S.) are identifying as sexual minorities than ever (Jones, 2021), and these youth are struggling with higher rates of depression, anxiety, and trauma than their heterosexual peers (e.g., Shearer et al., 2016; Smith et al., 2016). In the U.S., Sexual minority youth, who experience some degree of same-sex attraction, behavior, or identity (Lefevor et al., 2020), have reported three times the rate of suicidal ideation as heterosexual youth and suicide attempts up to five times higher (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC], 2016). Comparatively, all youth ages 15–24 years in the United States are at an extremely high risk for suicide and suicidal ideation. Suicide in this age group is the second leading cause of death, increasing at a national average rate of 25% annually (CDC, 2016). Additionally, deaths by suicide in the U.S. account for more than all natural causes combined in youth ages 10–24 years (Wyman et al., 2010).
Many sexual minority youth may therefore benefit from mental health supports, though research suggests they are often unsure about how to access quality affirming care and may run into barriers when doing so (Dunbar et al., 2017). Many sexual minority youth also report that their needs are frequently not met through mental health services (Dunbar et al., 2017). The current study contributes to an understanding of barriers to accessing support and how these could be addressed by examining the problem through a minority stress framework aimed at informing possible social ecological intervention in the home and school. The term sexual minority is used to describe the samples of interest, including U.S. adolescents (ages 13–17 years) who identify as gay, lesbian, bisexual, pansexual, fluid, asexual, queer, questioning, or as having same-sex attraction. The current study focuses on the experiences of sexual minorities without focusing on gender or the intersection between sexuality and gender identity. Therefore, we decided not to use the commonly accepted LGBTQ acronym (and its iterations) to describe the sample. Relatedly, discussions of the literature throughout this paper include the sample descriptors used within the original studies (e.g., LGBT, LGBTQ+, sexual minority) to stay true to how the participants and results were described in their respective studies.
Minority Stress Theory
In an effort to explain the health disparities found in sexual minority groups, Brooks (1981) and Meyer (2003) developed the now widely accepted minority stress model. The minority stress model posits that sexual minorities experience stressors associated with their sexual and gender identities that accumulate into significant internal distress and harm. These daily stressors are socially bound and experienced in addition to common stressors faced by all people. Additionally, research investigating minority stress since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic has suggested that the overlap of the pandemic alongside minority stressors has compounded and exacerbated the effects of minority stress through social isolation, greater potential for familial abuse, exclusion from public policy, and more (Salerno et al., 2020). Meyer’s (2003) framework parses global minority stress into two primary domains: distal and proximal stress. Distal stress includes external events, like structural stigma and interpersonal conflict, that are experienced by sexual minority individuals due to their identity. Proximal stress is the subjective interpretation and internalization of external events and attitudes, dependent on self-identity and including self-disgust, fear of rejection and harm, concealment, and other stress responses. Intersectionality, though sometimes categorized as a proximal stressor, appears to touch on themes from both distal and proximal stress. U.S.-based studies have found that ethnic and racial minorities who identify as sexual minorities may be more likely to experience stressors such as structural stigmas, gender policing, and racism (Schmitz et al., 2020).
Various frameworks have been outlined to identify specific distal and proximal stressors (Goldbach et al., 2014; Hatzenbuehler, 2011; Meyer, 2003), and it is generally assumed that proximal stressors are a byproduct of distal stress (Hatzenbuehler, 2009; Pachankis et al., 2015). Additionally, distal stress has been found to be a better predictor than proximal stress for behavioral outcomes such as psychological inflexibility, substance misuse, and suicidality in U.S.-based sexual minority adolescents (Hatzenbuehler et al., 2015; Weeks et al., 2021). When it comes to mental health supports addressing levels of minority stress, a social ecological framework might be best for understanding intervention across micro, mezzo, and macro levels (Asakura, 2016). Proximal stress is traditionally addressed within individualized counseling or group-based therapy focusing on resiliency, coping skills, self-compassion, and emotion regulation (Pachankis et al., 2015). While intervention focused on proximal stress is important, barriers to traditional therapy on its own may not make this form of treatment feasible across the broad scale of disparities seen in sexual minority youth. Furthermore, it is critical to recognize that many youth may not seek support via formal mental health services, choosing instead to seek support in home or school settings. Currently, 46% of sexual minority youth in the U.S. report wanting mental health services but not being able to receive them, citing some of the following reasons: financial burden, concerns regarding caregiver permissions, and concerns about finding a LGBTQ+ competent provider (The Trevor Project, 2020). Within this context, environmental interventions on a larger social scale (e.g., policy and systemic consultation) that focus on distal stressors like structural stigma may help address these disparities by providing feasible, sustainable, and effective group and community level supports for sexual minorities (Goldbach & Gibbs, 2017; Hatzenbuehler, 2016). For sexual minority youth, two such areas that might benefit from intervention are family acceptance and school climate, given these are contexts within which youth spend most of their day.
Family Acceptance
In the U.S, parental attitudes toward their children’s sexual minority identities seem to be changing for the better over time. A 1998 study found that youth who had “come out” to their parents experienced higher rates of verbal and physical abuse and suicidal behaviors than those who had not (D’Augelli et al., 2010). However, 15 years later, Rosario & Schrimshaw (2012) conducted a review of the sexual minority disclosure literature and found that, of the two-thirds of sexual minority youth who had disclosed their identity, roughly half of their parents were accepting of their child’s sexual orientation. Further, in a more recent narrative review, Ghosh (2020) reported that the majority of parents responded in an accepting manner when their children disclosed their sexual orientation and, for parents who initially did not respond with acceptance, they eventually became accepting over time.
Family acceptance of their child’s sexual identity has been found to reduce stress and substance use and act as a protective factor (Padilla et al., 2010). In a social ecological study looking at individual, family, and environmental influences on psychological distress, it was found that family acceptance mitigated the influence of environmental factors (e.g., stigma and discrimination) on an individual’s experienced stress (Gartner & Sterzing, 2018). Conversely, family rejection creates an unsafe home environment for sexual minority youth and is associated with mental health risks. For example, a recent national survey reported that 19% of U.S. youth encouraged to change their identity (i.e., experiencing family rejection) attempted suicide, while that percentage was reduced to 8% in youth who were accepted by their family (The Trevor Project, 2020). Additionally, compared to those who experienced family acceptance, young adults who experienced high rates of family rejection were found to be eight times more likely to attempt suicide, six times more likely to report depressive symptoms, three times more likely to engage in risky sexual behavior, and three times more likely to misuse drugs (Ryan et al., 2009; Ryan et al., 2010).
Congruent with the minority stress model, research has shown that family rejection, which is a distal stressor, is associated with internalized homophobia, which is a proximal stressor (D’Augelli et al., 2010). This finding supports the theoretical proposition that proximal stress is a byproduct of distal stress and centers family acceptance as a critical component in understanding the origins and development of minority stress among sexual minority youth. Considered with the findings reviewed earlier, family acceptance and the home environment are clearly important in explaining sexual minority youths’ mental health disparities. Yet an accepting family alone does not account for youths’ primary environmental influences and should therefore be considered in conjunction with the other social setting where youth spend much of their day: the school climate.
School Climate
The nature and role of school climate—defined as the unique physical and social environment of a specific school and how its values, goals, norms, and structures influence relations, behaviors, health and safety, and education—has been studied for decades (Cohen & Geier, 2010; Halpin & Croft, 1962; Hoy & Miskel, 2011). In this study, school climate is operationalized through factors identified as critical to creating positive environments for sexual minority youth, including school-based protective policies, social supports, supportive personnel, and inclusive curriculum. This operationalization aligns with empirical evidence on what fosters positive school climates for LGBTQ+ youth, as identified by Fantus & Newman (2021), who emphasize multilevel interventions that integrate proximal factors, like teacher-student interactions and inclusive curricula, with broader systemic supports, such as affirmative policies and resource allocation. While these measures are tailored to LGBTQ+ students, they ultimately contribute to fostering safer and more inclusive school environments for all students.
Youth spend a large portion of their day in school settings where the social influences are shifted from immediate family to teachers, administrators, and peers. While school climate in the United States can vary greatly depending on the state, region, and type of school, some schools have begun to introduce affirming practices at varying degrees, like implementing more robust consequences for sexual- or gender-based bullying behaviors and offering LGBTQ+ clubs and spaces to gather. Secondary schools that have introduced affirming practices and have accepting school personnel have LGBQ+ students who report better school experiences and academic outcomes, and reduced substance use, victimization at school, and psychological distress compared to those who reported experiencing negative school climate or lacked in-school supports (Heck et al., 2013; Kosciw et al., 2013).
While the literature shows accepting school-based supports may improve student wellbeing, the reality is that few states have taken action to support their LGBQ+ students in schools (Demissie et al., 2018). Most schools still implement outdated educational practices that can be harmful and counterproductive to an affirming school climate, such as teaching heterosexual-only sex education or requiring school personnel to avoid LGBQ+ affirming discussions (Kosciw et al., 2020). In recent years, many states have begun retracting protections for LGBTQ+ youth and passing restrictive and discriminatory legislation. The American Civil Liberties Union (2024) tracked 41 new anti-LGTBQ+ state laws that recently passed, including policies around curriculum censorship, restricting access to school facilities, sports bans, and “forced outing.” While these are some of the most recent laws passed, the American Civil Liberties Union has also identified 111 more that are currently in the process of becoming law. These school-based policies and practices set the tone for the school climate that affects how sexual minority students are treated by both educators and peers. Almost all sexual minority students have reported hearing derogatory language used in their school, most have experienced verbal harassment due to their sexual orientation, and over half have been physically or sexually harassed or assaulted due to their sexual identity (Kosciw et al., 2020). Studies of current students found that LGBT-related victimization and fear of violence at school were associated with suicidal ideation and suicidal behavior, lower academic achievement, and lower self-esteem (Barnett et al., 2019; Kosciw et al., 2013).
Like in the family environment, distal stressors in the school environment contribute to harmful outcomes for sexual minority youth. This centers the school alongside the family in terms of its influence on minority stress and, potentially, offers a pair of viable settings and targets for assessment and intervention related to supporting sexual minority youth. However, merely investigating each setting’s climate on its own (i.e., family vs. school) fails to account for the environmental overlap and reciprocal social influence the settings may have on a student and on each other. Neither climate is self-contained, and both have reciprocal influences on each other, as school-based activities often engage and involve families (e.g., homework, parent-teacher conferences, sporting events). Thus, exploring how to mitigate minority stress experiences through family acceptance and school climate by recognizing the relationship each setting has on minority stress, and then on sexual minority students’ wellbeing broadly, may be important for understanding how to best support sexual minority youth across settings.
Family–School Relationship
The effects of the school environment on the family environment have been well known for decades, with Epstein (1990, p. 102) referring to the home and school as “overlapping spheres of influence.” U.S.-based studies have found that the influence of the family–school relationship on youths’ academic performance is bidirectional, as the school has ability to affect the family while the family also has ability to affect the school (Coleman, 1987; Epstein, 1986). The consistent finding that the home environment has significant influence on youths’ academic performance has led to many U.S. school districts, accrediting bodies, and governmental agencies making the family–school relationship a top priority (e.g., Every Student Succeeds Act [ESSA], 2015; the National Association for the Education of Young Children [NAEYC], 2017; and the Council for the Accreditation of Educator Preparation [CAEP], 2013). While most earlier studies of home–school effects focused on academic outcomes such as performance and motivation (e.g., Epstein, 1986), the proposition that the home–school relationship can have influence on a communities’ social attitudes has existed for over a century (e.g., Dewey, 1915). Government agencies, both local and federal, have attempted to use this idea in approaching issues of social justice, and specifically school segregation, through educational policy and law. As a recent example of such policy, the ESSA (2015) spotlights equity in education by developing meaningful relationships with minoritized families and increasing parental involvement, ensuring families have a voice in the decisions made by schools to support youth.
The notion that schools create strong communities that can be drivers of social change seems to be well-established, yet there is surprisingly little empirical evidence supporting this idea. Studies assessing how schools could address barriers to the home–school relationship for families of ethnic and racial minority, linguistically diverse, low-income, and immigrant students have found that, if schools can tailor their outreach to marginalized communities, then they can create a school environment of support and inclusion and increase equity, cultural responsiveness, and family–school collaboration and trust (Auerbach, 2009; Chrispeels & Rivero, 2001). Additionally, in looking at environmentally sustainable behaviors, Addi-Raccah et al. (2018) found that schools in Israel were in fact prominent driving factors for social change in their local communities through their involvement with parents. Addi-Raccah and colleagues suggest their findings could be generalized to social justice attitudes in the local community through inclusion of parents, developing lines of communication, and being sensitive to the local community’s needs.
Less has been studied regarding the interaction between sexual minority students’ family–school relationships; however, some findings have shown that schools’ mishandling of LGBQ+ issues have led to marginalization and negative experiences for entire families (Casper & Schultz, 1999). Additionally, Kosciw & Diaz (2008) found that when LGBT parents were mistreated by other parents, teachers, and administrators at their child’s school, these experiences led to an increased hostile school climate toward children of LGBT families by peers and school personnel and reduced family–school interaction. Indeed, the effects of school climate have been so strong that LGBTQ+ parents have been found to make complex school selections for their children based on considerations related to how schools handle diversity and inclusion of the entire family (Leland, 2019).
The Present Study
The present study investigated family acceptance and school climate as two important distal factors for reducing the minority stress that predicts sexual minority youths’ mental health, with a focus on subjective wellbeing across settings. Thus far, no other study has looked at the effects of family acceptance and school climate on psychological outcomes for sexual minority youth in the same model. The research outlined above has considered each climate unilaterally, but the reality is that both school climate and family acceptance are likely to reciprocally affect each other. Moreover, the current study investigated global minority stress as a mediator between the effects of school climate and family acceptance on sexual minority youths’ global life satisfaction, school satisfaction, and family satisfaction, respectively. Outcome variables focusing on domain-specific life satisfaction provided a strengths-based approach for understanding how to help sexual minority students’ thrive, and attempted to step away from the more common deficits-based model that frames most of the research reviewed above. This way of modelling these variables can contribute to understanding the magnitude and directionality of influence in the family–school relationship on youth outcomes. This study was guided by three research questions:
1.
Does minority stress mediate the effects of family acceptance and school climate on sexual minority adolescents’ global life satisfaction when controlled for in the same model?
2.
Will evidence for the family–school relationship exist in looking at minority stress and its influence on the relationship between school climate and family acceptance on outcomes related to school and home satisfaction?
3.
Do school climate and family acceptance differentially influence sexual minority adolescents’ global and domain-specific life satisfaction through minority stress when controlled for in the same model?
Methods
Procedures
The present study collected data using self-report methods built on the Qualtrics® surveying platform. Data was collected at one time point near the end of the 2021 academic school year. Qualtrics research panels were used to identify youth who met inclusion criteria (see below), and participating youth were compensated via Qualtrics’ standard procedures for their research panels. Due to research requirements with minors in the U.S., requirements of the local Institutional Review Board (IRB), and limitations of purposive sampling procedures, parental consent was obtained prior to youth assent, which required participants to be “out” to their parents.
Considering the transition of social influence in adolescence and the likelihood that teenagers are still living at home while attending school, grade school students aged 13–17 years were identified as the target demographic. Given the intended mediational design of the study, data would optimally be collected longitudinally; however, due to concerns regarding confidentiality, rates of attrition, and financial feasibility, cross-sectional data was collected as a proxy. We therefore frame our design as an analog mediation analysis, recognizing its limitations at the outset. To simulate temporal assumptions of a true mediational design, measures were adapted to ask for retrospective participant ratings at the beginning of the semester, one month ago, and over the past week. Though explicitly defining the temporal order in cross-sectional mediational analyses is best if longitudinal data cannot be collected, it should be noted that this biases the study due to auto-regressive effects (Gelfand et al., 2009). All research procedures were pre-approved by the authors’ university IRB.
Participants
Participant eligibility criteria included age (i.e., 13–17 years) and sexual orientation (i.e., identifying as LGB +). In total, 293 high school-aged sexual minority adolescents across the United States were recruited via a Qualtrics research panel using purposive sampling procedures. The median age of participants was 16 years, with few participants identifying as 13 (3.4%) or 14 (6.8%) and far more identifying as 15 (21.2%), 16 (25.3%) or 17 (43.3%). The sample primarily identified as female (70.6%) and bisexual (59.7%). Other prevalent sexual orientations within the sample included gay (4.4%), lesbian (12.3%), pansexual (10.9%), queer (3.1%), and asexual (3.1%). Other common gender identities within the sample include male (7.5%), transgender man (3.8%), and gender nonconforming or genderqueer (15.7%). Racial/ethnic identities of participants included White (39.6%), Hispanic or Latinx (21.5%), Black or African American (13.3%), Asian (8.5%), and multiracial (10.2%).
Measures
Demographic questionnaire
Based on best practice when formulating demographic items for minority group participants, respondents were asked to specify their sexual orientation, age, gender, and race/ethnicity. Race and ethnicity were asked in the same item, with participants given the opportunity to select all races and ethnicities with which they identified. Those who indicated more than one race or ethnicity were categorized as “multiracial.” Additionally, age of sexual identity disclosure to caregivers and the nature of the school setting were considered. School setting (i.e., in person, virtual, homeschool, hybrid) was assessed at each retrospective time point (i.e., beginning of the semester, one month ago, and over the past week) to control for school disruption resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic.
LGBTQ-Specific Family Support Scale
The LGBTQ-Specific Family Support Scale (LGBTQ-SFSS; Miller et al., 2020), adapted from Ryan et al. (2010) original 100+ item measure of family acceptance, assessed the same construct but in a more feasible manner, with fewer items. The LGBTQ-SFSS instructions were modified slightly, asking students to answer questions based on their experience from the beginning of the spring term or roughly 4 months prior to completing the survey. Miller et al.’s scale uses eight items asking about positive (4 items) and negative (4 items, reverse-scored) family behaviors associated with accepting attitudes toward LGBTQ+ individuals. Miller et al. (2020) found the measure to have strong internal consistency reliability (α = 0.92) and divergent validity evidence with a measure of depression.
National School Climate Survey
The National School Climate Survey (NSCS; Kosciw & Diaz, 2006) developed by the Gay, Lesbian, Straight Education Network (GLSEN) is a U.S.-based, 17-item measure assessing sexual minority youths’ perceptions of school climate. The instructions for the NSCS were adapted similarly to the LGBTQ-SFSS, asking students to reflect back 4 months. School climate is assessed by looking at four major areas, including sexual minority school-based protective/anti-bullying policies (i.e., safety, harassment, and protections of expression), clubs and social supports (i.e., representation and avenues for addressing issues in the school), supportive school personnel (i.e., levels of support and how LGBT topics are discussed), and inclusive curriculum (i.e., representation in books, lessons, and specific classes). Examples of questions include, “Does your school have a policy or a procedure for reporting incidents of harassment or assault in school?”, “Were you taught about LGBT people, history, or events in any of your classes?”, and “Does your school have a type of club that addresses LGBT student issues?” Because data from the NSCS have traditionally been reported at the individual item level, psychometrics for the measure when used as a composite scale and subscales have yet to be published. However, mean scale scores can be calculated for the subdomains and were reported as an average-subdomain score in the current study. Bivariate correlations and internal consistency reliability of the NSCS were evaluated to determine if the mean scale scores were appropriate for use in the primary analyses.
Sexual Minority Adolescent Stress Inventory
The Sexual Minority Adolescent Stress Inventory (SMASI; Schrager et al., 2018) is a 62-item measure used to assess minority stress experienced by adolescents across 11 subscales: intersectionality, negative expectancies, identity management, internalized homonegativity, negative disclosure experience, homonegative climate, homonegative communication, family rejection, social marginalization, work, and religion. Students were asked to respond based on experiences in the past month. Responses to items are coded in a binary fashion (i.e., “no” = 0 and “yes” = 1). Higher total scores represent greater experiences of minority stress. The SMASI has been found to have strong internal consistency reliability (Schrager et al., 2018; Weeks et al., 2020), good divergent validity evidence with general life stress, and criterion validity evidence with mental health outcomes across diverse adolescent samples (Goldbach et al., 2017; Goldbach et al., 2021).
Multidimensional Students’ Life Satisfaction Scale
The Multidimensional Students’ Life Satisfaction Scale (MSLSS; Huebner, 1994) is a 40-item measure assessing subjective wellbeing across the subdomains of family, friends, school, living environment, and self-satisfaction in adolescents. The instructions were slightly modified, asking students to respond based on experiences within the past month. Many studies have evaluated the psychometrics of the MSLSS and have structurally validated the measure through factor analyses, with results showing good internal consistency (αs = 0.70s–0.90s) and test-retest reliability (rs = 0.70s–0.90s; Lani, 2010).
Statistical Analyses
Using R statistical software (R Core Team, 2021), preliminary descriptive analyses were conducted for all measures to look at central tendencies, response distributions, and internal consistency. Additionally, bivariate correlations were evaluated to determine the strength, directionality, and relative independence among measures. Contingent on all assumptions being met, covariate demographic categories larger than n = 30 were determined based on sample size and representation to ensure groups were large enough to conduct meaningful analyses. Based on demographic categorization at this stage, the largest group was set as the reference group, from which intercepts and estimates could be interpreted.
Two analog mediational analyses were conducted in R using the Lavaan package (Rosseel, 2012). Model 1 (see Fig. 1) evaluated the effect of school climate and family acceptance on global life satisfaction through minority stress by comparing the indirect effect on the direct linear regression of the same model without minority stress. Model 2 (see Fig. 1) investigated the effect of family acceptance and school climate on family satisfaction and school satisfaction, respectively, through minority stress, while accounting for the direct effects of family acceptance and school climate on family satisfaction and school satisfaction. Using the indirect effects approach (Preacher & Hayes, 2004), significant indirect effects determined mediation or partial-mediation when larger than the direct effect. Given the sample size was relatively small, a bias-corrected bootstrap resampling using 10,000 samples to produce a 95% confidence interval was conducted to improve the accuracy of significance tests and distribution assumptions for both analog mediation models. Additionally, both models included the covariates of age, gender, sexual orientation, race/ethnicity, age of disclosure to parents, and school setting.
Fig. 1
Model 1: School Climate and Family Acceptance on Global Life Satisfaction Through Minority Stress. Model 2: School Climate and Family Acceptance on Family Satisfaction and School Satisfaction Through Minority Stress. Note. Con = control variables (i.e., age, gender, race, ethnicity, age of disclosure, school setting). Solid line = direct effects; Dotted line = indirect effects; Bolded line = effect of control. Coefficients presented are beta-weights. Bold coefficients = p < 0.05. p values: a = 0.006, bd = 0.000, cd = 0.000, e = 0.003, fh = 0.001, gh = 0.001, fi = 0.000, gi = 0.000
×
Results
Preliminary Analyses
Data from 293 sexual minority adolescents (ages 13–17 years) was evaluated to determine missingness and the adequacy of the measures and responses, based on distribution, normality, correlation, and internal consistency reliability results—Cronbach’s α for well-validated measures (i.e., MSLSS and SMASI) and McDonald’s ω for less-validated measures (i.e., LGBTQ-SFSS and NSCS). No response values were missing, and all variables were deemed to be relatively normally distributed (skewness and kurtosis values <|1|), suggesting they were appropriate for use in the primary analyses. Additionally, all measures exhibited good to excellent internal consistency reliability (ωs range = 0.88–0.92), with the exception of the NSCS, which showed weaker but adequate internal consistency reliability (ω = 0.69). All descriptives for each measure are reported in Table 1. Bivariate correlations (Pearson's r) showed expected levels of strength and directionality between measures (see Table 1); most correlations emerged as statistically significant (p < 0.01), except for those with the school satisfaction subscale.
Table 1
Descriptive statistics, internal consistency, and correlations for study measures
Measure
M
SD
min
max
α
ω
NSCS
LGBTQ-SFSS
SMASI
MSLSS
Family
School
NSCS
2.11
0.40
1.18
3.62
–
0.69
–
LGBTQ-SFSS
1.96
0.95
0
4
–
0.90
0.18*
–
SMASI
18.23
9.97
0
51
0.92
–
−0.49*
−0.34*
–
MSLSS
152.12
27.79
59
235
0.91
–
0.26*
0.15*
−0.41*
–
Family
26.29
8.92
7
42
0.92
–
0.24*
0.21*
−0.38*
0.68*
–
School
24.09
9.21
8
48
0.88
–
0.02
0.07
−0.06
0.25*
0.08
–
NSCS = National School Climate Survey, LGBTQ-SFSS = LGBTQ-Specific Family Support Scale, SMASI = Sexual Minority Adolescent Stress Inventory, MSLSS = Multidimensional Students’ Life Satisfaction Scale; Family = MSLSS Family Satisfaction subscale; School = MSLSS School Satisfaction subscale
*p < 0.01
Primary Analyses
Due to the large number of demographic subgroups, groups with samples of less than 30 were aggregated into an “other” category to prevent meaningless results in the analyses. Transgender participants were categorized as the gender with which they identify and not included in the “other” group, according to best practice (De Vries et al., 2011). The majority groups were coded as the reference for all demographic variables in the mediation analyses.
Model 1
The effect of family acceptance and school climate on global life satisfaction through minority stress was investigated. Results for Model 1 (see Fig. 1) demonstrated excellent model fit (RMSEA [90% CI] <0.001 [0.000, 0.041], CFI = 1.00, SRMR = 0.029) and medium to large effect sizes for predicting minority stress (R2 = 0.27) and life satisfaction (R2 = 0.19). A linear regression suggested that the relationship between family acceptance and life satisfaction was not statistically significant (β = −0.03, p = 0.661, SE = 0.06), though the relationship between school climate and life satisfaction was statistically significant (β = 0.15, p = 0.006, SE = 0.14). Using minority stress as a mediator, a significant indirect effect was discovered while accounting for demographic and school setting covariates (see Table 2). These differences suggest that accepting school and home environments may reduce minority stress, which may then increase global life satisfaction. Overall, Model 1 demonstrated partial mediation through minority stress according to the indirect effects approach (Preacher & Hayes, 2004), with the covariate of gender showing statistical significance (p = 0.005) and suggesting a possible difference between groups.
Table 2
Model 1: Direct and indirect estimates on global life satisfaction
Predictor
Unstandardized
Estimate [95% CI]
Standardized Estimate
p value
Standard Error
School Climate (direct)
0.39 [0.12, 0.66]
0.15
0.006
0.14
Family Acceptance (direct)
−0.03 [−0.14, 0.09]
−0.03
0.661
0.06
School Climate (indirect)
0.32 [0.19, 0.48]
0.13
0.000
0.08
Family Acceptance (indirect)
0.11 [0.06, 0.17]
0.10
0.000
0.03
Covariates
Age
0.03 [−0.97, 0.99]
<0.01
0.955
0.50
Gender
1.54 [0.45, 2.61]
0.14
0.005
0.55
Race/Ethnicity
0.10 [−0.56, 0.79]
0.02
0.764
0.34
Sexual orientation
0.26 [−0.48, 1.00]
0.04
0.481
0.37
Age of disclosure
−0.15 [−1.01, 0.90]
−0.01
0.915
0.49
School setting
0.26 [−1.31, 1.92]
0.02
0.752
0.82
Bold = p < 0.05
Model 2
In Model 2, the effects of family acceptance and school climate on family satisfaction and school satisfaction, respectively, through minority stress were examined. Results for Model 2 (see Fig. 1) demonstrated excellent model fit (RMSEA [90% CI] < 0.001 [0.000, 0.045], CFI = 1.00, SRMR = 0.032) and medium to large effect sizes for predicting minority stress (R2 = 0.27), family satisfaction (R2 = 0.16), and school satisfaction (R2 = 0.11). The direct effect of family acceptance on family satisfaction was not statistically significant (β = 0.08, p = 0.143, SE = 0.54), nor was the direct effect of school climate on family satisfaction (β = 0.10, p = 0.097, SE = 1.31). Likewise, the linear regression of family acceptance on school satisfaction was non-significant (β = −0.09, p = 0.133, SE = 0.58); however, school climate did significantly predict school satisfaction (β = 0.18, p = 0.003, SE = 1.40). When minority stress was introduced as a mediator along with demographic and school setting covariates, indirect effects were found for all pathways and a direct effect for school climate on school satisfaction was observed. Gender also significantly predicted minority stress, suggesting differences among groups, with those not identifying with the reference group (i.e., girls/women and trans girls/women) experiencing significantly higher levels of minority stress (see Table 3). These findings suggest that accepting schools and families may reduce minority stress, which may then increase family satisfaction and school satisfaction. Findings also indicated that the statistically significant indirect effects of family acceptance and school climate are shared with a direct effect of school climate on school satisfaction, with satisfaction increasing as school climate is more accepting. Overall, Model 2 demonstrated a partial mediation through minority stress according to the indirect effects approach (Preacher & Hayes, 2004).
Table 3
Model 2: Direct and indirect estimates
School Satisfaction
Predictor
Unstandardized
Estimate [95% CI]
Standardized Estimate
p value
Standard Error
School Climate (direct)
4.19 [1.54, 7.01]
0.18
0.003
1.40
Family Acceptance (direct)
−0.86 [−2.01, 0.27]
−0.09
0.133
0.58
School Climate (indirect)
1.86 [0.86, 3.12]
0.08
0.001
0.57
Family Acceptance (indirect)
0.62 [0.31, 1.06]
0.06
0.001
0.19
Family Satisfaction
Unstandardized
Estimate [95% CI]
Standardized Estimate
p value
Standard Error
School Climate (direct)
2.18 [−0.23, 4.87]
0.10
0.097
1.31
Family Acceptance (direct)
0.79 [−0.23, 1.88]
0.08
0.143
0.54
School Climate (indirect)
2.51 [1.43, 3.86]
0.11
0.000
0.62
Family Acceptance (indirect)
0.83 [0.44, 1.35]
0.09
0.000
0.23
Covariates
Unstandardized
Estimate [95% CI]
Standardized Estimate
p value
Standard Error
Age
0.03 [−0.97, 0.99]
<0.01
0.955
0.50
Gender
1.54 [0.45, 2.61]
0.14
0.005
0.55
Race/Ethnicity
0.10 [−0.56, 0.79]
0.02
0.764
0.34
Sexual orientation
0.26 [−0.48, 1.00]
0.04
0.481
0.37
Age of disclosure
−0.15 [−1.01, 0.90]
−0.01
0.915
0.49
School setting
0.26 [−1.31, 1.92]
0.02
0.752
0.82
Bold = p < 0.05
Discussion
Taken together, the results from this study indicated that minority stress partially mediated the relationships between school climate and family acceptance on global life satisfaction in sexual minority adolescents ages 13–17 years. Furthermore, we found that school climate directly predicted global life satisfaction (see Model 1). We also found that minority stress mediated the relationship between school climate and family acceptance with family satisfaction, but that it only partially mediated the relationship between family acceptance and school climate with school satisfaction, as school climate also significantly predicted school satisfaction (see Model 2). In both models, gender was found to be a statistically significant covariate, with non-women/girls and trans women/girls reporting greater levels of minority stress. These results support existing literature that both school and family environments are meaningful predictors of sexual minority youths’ mental health in the U.S. (Barnett et al., 2019; D’Augelli et al., 2010; Russell et al., 2011; Ryan et al., 2010). Our findings also enhance the literature by demonstrating this relationship with positive mental health outcomes—global and domain-specific life satisfaction—as opposed to the traditional focus on mental health problems, risks, and deficits. This strengths-based perspective can contribute to a research base regarding how to help sexual minority adolescents thrive, not just survive.
This study went further than prior studies by accounting for these relationships via minority stress and looking at school climate and family acceptance in the same model, which controlled for their reciprocal influence on each other when considering their respective predictive power. This study also extended previous literature by evaluating how each domain-specific climate (i.e., school and family) predicted domain-specific satisfaction in the other environment (i.e., family and school), through minority stress. These added features were important given the hypothesized overlap in social influence between the family–school environment, as outlined in the Introduction section (see, e.g., Epstein, 1990). By analyzing the models in this way, we discovered that while both school climate and family acceptance are statistically significant predictors of global life satisfaction, family satisfaction, and school satisfaction through minority stress, school climate was the stronger predictor overall—and the only predictor to directly influence school satisfaction and global life satisfaction. These results, along with the practical point that school is an environment in which intervention is more accessible—allowing for tiered supports and more equitable service access (Fazel et al., 2014; Goldbach & Gibbs, 2017; Merrell et al., 2022)—are important in stressing the value of affirming interventions that target school climate and the potential collateral effects of these interventions on sexual minority adolescents’ life satisfaction in other domains.
Early work looking at the family–school environment is mixed in support of the current results, particularly in studies measuring academic outcomes (Coleman, 1987; Epstein, 1986). Given the difference in outcome variables examined in the current study vs. prior studies (i.e., social vs. academic), the family–school environment may differ in direction of influence depending on the type of support. Around the time youth enter middle school, social influence begins to shift from family to peers and school (Blaževic, 2016). Additionally, social settings like schools are larger in scope and may rely on more than a single parent or group of parents to drive change. With various stakeholders at the school level bringing differing and sometimes conflicting social views, social change might start within the school as a collective attitude and then move outward toward the family. This pathway of influence is likely different than that of academic outcomes, which seem to be more influenceable by individual caregivers, where most stakeholders can agree on educational values (Jacob & Lefgren, 2007). Thus, spheres of influence might be bidirectional, but with the school holding more weight for social outcomes.
Studies examining the influence of the family–school environment on social outcomes discovered that schools in the U.S. targeting support and inclusion were able to increase home–school collaboration and trust for ethnic and racial minority, linguistically diverse, low-income, and immigrant families (Auerbach, 2009; Chrispeels & Rivero, 2001). Both Auerbach (2009) and Chrispeels & Rivero (2001) found schools that demonstrated a commitment to creating inclusive environments where families felt valued and were encouraged to participate actively in their children’s education were crucial in reshaping marginalized family’s sense of belonging and in influencing their children’s education, ultimately leading to improved student success. While the current study is the first to examine how the social climate of school might influence sexual minority adolescents’ family satisfaction through minority stress, it is possible that results from studies like Auerbach (2009) and Chrispeels & Rivero (2001) can be generalized to sexual minorities and their families to help understand the current results. Relatedly, in an attempt to affect change in the local community through schools, Addi-Raccah et al. (2018) found that schools in Israel, through their involvement with parents and families, were driving factors for social change in their communities. Results from these studies, and the current one, support the idea that social change may be most influential when targeted in a school setting by subsequently impacting the local community and levels of family acceptance.
Limitations and Future Directions
Results of this study should be considered in light of limitations that constrain generality. First, the lack of balanced gender representation in our sample and the finding that gender was a significant covariate suggest that the generalizability of results to students who do not identify as women/girls is unknown. Future studies should aim to collect more gender-diverse samples to represent the array of student identities present in the schools and to align these samplings with the best available evidence of gender identity prevalence rates among youth in the U.S. Furthermore, this study was also conducted during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic and therefore it is unknown if results may generalize to more stable periods in youths’ lives. Additionally, this study focused on the experiences of sexual minorities, deemphasizing the unique experiences of sexual minorities who are also gender minorities. Given more youth are identifying as gender diverse (Richards et al., 2016), the literature should reflect that by including gender minority participants and genderqueer-focused measures (e.g., Testa et al., 2015). This is especially important given that we cannot assume that research with cisgender youth will necessarily generalize to transgender and gender nonconforming youth (e.g., Weeks et al., 2023).
The present study has a few other methodological limitations. Because parental consent was required, self-selection bias was possible given that families who are aware of their child’s sexual orientation may be more accepting than families of youth who are concealing their identity. Moreover, while broad school climate measures exist that are suitable for all students, psychometrically sound measures of sexual minority youths’ perceptions of school climate and family acceptance were either not publicly available or accessible for use in this research. For the purposes of this study, we found the LGBTQ-SFSS to be internally reliable and to correlate as expected with other measures; however, future studies should aim to use more well-validated instruments as they are developed and made accessible for research purposes. Moreover, while the statistical models in this study were described and analyzed as a mediational design, this would imply that the data was collected over different time points. Due to logistical restraints, the current study used a retrospective surveying procedure that asked participants to reflect on their attitudes at varying points across the course of a semester and, thus, did not truly collect the data at different time points. We therefore framed this study as an analog mediation analysis, recognizing it does not meet the strict assumptions of true temporal mediation. Future research could improve upon the present study by using a true longitudinal research design to follow-up with sexual minority adolescents over the course of a school year. Thus, although the current study takes a first step toward addressing potential causal claims, a true longitudinal design is necessary for causal inferences.
Implications for Practice
Our findings suggest several potential implications for practice. First, the results and interpretation provided above support the rationale for the adoption of LGBQ+ affirming interventions, supports, and policies aimed at improving the social climate in schools. If an accepting school climate reduces minority stress experienced by students and therefore increases their global, school, and family satisfaction, then school administrators and educators might use this framework to develop strategies to target minority stress and improve sexual minority youths’ wellbeing at school.
Next, results suggest the minority stress model provides a multi-level approach for understanding the experiences of the LGBQ+ population (Meyer, 2003), which is well suited for schools implementing multi-tiered systems of support to promote students’ behavioral and mental health (Merrell et al., 2022). For example, at the tier one level, schools might implement school- and class-wide interventions and policies targeting distal stressors experienced by sexual minority students, such as social marginalization, homonegative communication, and homonegative climate—strategies which have been shown to improve the school climate for LGBQ+ youth in the U.S. (Hatzenbuehler, 2011; Heck et al., 2013). Examples of interventions and policies that might be beneficial at this universal level include specific protections against harassment, bullying, and victimization; providing informed crisis response teams; eliminating dress codes; offering supplementary academic supports; sponsoring ongoing training for school personnel in affirming practices with LGBQ+ students; teaching LGBQ+ topics in relevant classes (e.g., history and language arts); facilitating access to off-campus supports with expertise in LGBQ+ issues; and creating spaces where queer youth can organize and share community with peers and school personnel (Demissie et al., 2018; Toomey et al., 2018).
In addition to universal intervention and prevention, supplementary therapeutic supports that are more tailored at the targeted (small-group) level or intensive (individualized) level could aid in the reduction of students’ proximal minority stress (e.g., McGeorge & Stone Carlson, 2011; Williams & McGillicuddy-De Lisi, 1999). Proximal stressors might be addressed in groups through school-sponsored clubs like Gay-Straight Alliance, Campus Pride, or GLSEN, where students gain exposure to peers and school personnel like them and can practice advocacy and dismantling heteronormative discourses. Also, support groups led by school mental health professionals might target particular proximal stressors (e.g., negative expectancies, internalized homonegativity, identity management) and promote resiliency in a therapeutic peer-support setting (Meyer, 2015). As needed, intensive LGBQ+ affirming interventions focusing on coping skills, self-compassion, self-esteem, emotion regulation, and resilience could also target proximal stressors on a more individualized scale (Pachankis et al., 2015; Meyer, 2015) and could include tailored intervention that considers the student’s unique experiences and intersectionality (Schmitz et al., 2020).
While the school environment can help students through tiered systems of support, past literature (e.g., Auerbach, 2009; Chrispeels & Rivero, 2001) as well as the current study provide rationale for more broad community outreach that is focused on creating accepting and inclusive social attitudes. Findings suggest attitudes from the school can spread into the broader community, but more direct outreach and collaboration between educators and families may more clearly drive social change (Addi-Raccah et al., 2018). Thus, including family and the broader community in school trainings, social events, and activities could be valuable in cultivating a society that is accepting of LGBQ+ youth. Some examples of how schools could practice community outreach might include creating LGBQ+ clubs that engage with the local community through service, hosting affirming social activities that are open to the public, extending school hours so students and parents can meet with administrators and access school resources, and providing open trainings for the community (Luke & Goodrich, 2015; Toomey et al., 2018).
Additionally, connecting with families directly, and especially making concerted efforts to connect with families of LGBQ+ students, may have great benefits on students’ family satisfaction. Families might want to connect with schools but feel they will not be heard or valued (Fenton et al., 2017). More specifically, LGBQ+ families might feel unsafe getting involved with the school (Kosciw & Diaz, 2008). Foundational training standards and guidelines for teachers, administrators, and school personnel in the U.S. already recommend including families (e.g., ESSA, 2015; NAEYC, 2017; CAEP, 2013), and educators could do so by sending home newsletters, conducting home visits, texting updates, holding open houses, hiring parent liaisons, forming parent–teacher organizations, and having teachers and administrators directly reaching out to contact parents (Luet, 2017).
Furthermore, it is crucial that school interventions and supports should be monitored to determine their effectiveness and value (Mandinach & Gummer, 2013; Merrell et al., 2022). School mental health, academic, and behavioral screeners collecting sexual orientation and gender identity data might be disaggregated to allow educators to look at LGBQ+ students’ changes in attitudes or perceptions of school climate over time (cf. Kiperman et al., 2024), especially as the school puts supplementary supports in place. Additionally, sexual minority students placed at-risk for emotional and behavioral problems might be further assessed for their experiences of minority stress, and this supplemental data might be used to identify specific problems and match targeted supports to address specific stressors. The SMASI, as outlined in this study, is a viable self-report measure for determining global minority stress in adolescents and is free and easy to administer and score. Additionally, although it was not used for these purposes in the present study, scores from the SMASI could be used at the subscale level to determine the specific stressors with which sexual minority students might be struggling (e.g., social marginalization, internalized homonegativity) and the types of supports they might benefit from (Schrager et al., 2018).
In closing, it should be noted that there are limitations to the aforementioned implications. As stated in the Introduction section, current state and federal laws in the U.S. may create barriers for those advocating for affirming school-based policies and decisions (American Civil Liberties Union, 2024). Even the most well-intentioned teachers may not be able to incorporate all suggested interventions and supports for cultivating an affirming school climate, and therefore schools and districts should be mindful of how their scope of practice might be limited in their local education agency. School personnel should also be mindful of how legal and cultural barriers affect the wellbeing of their students, especially those identifying as LGBTQ+, as the literature suggests that restrictive LGBTQ+ laws in schools affect students negatively via increased stigmatization, hostile environments, barriers to support, and rates of mental health issues (Heck et al., 2013; Kosciw et al., 2013; Tran et al., 2023). Though the reality of these limitations may be difficult and confusing to work with in school settings, awareness can empower school administrators and educators to know where they can make a difference for the students they serve. Applied research can also continue progressing understanding around effective action toward these ends. Researchers, educators, and mental health professionals interested in these topics are encouraged to continue advancing this line of applied research with the aim of promoting the wellbeing of sexual minority youth, both now and into the future.
Compliance with Ethical Standards
Conflict of interest
The authors declare no competing interests.
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