Moral intuitions and attitudes toward gay men: can moral psychology add to our understanding of Homonegativity?

Rosik, Christopher H. ; Dinges, Laura J.

In the present study, we surveyed university students (n = 183) to determine if the inclusion of moral intuitions as described in Moral Foundations Theory (MFT) would aid in the explanation of two types of homonegativity toward gay men. After accounting for demographic variables, social desirability, and intrinsic religiousness, results of hierarchical multiple regression procedures indicated that the inclusion of moral intuitions improved prediction of both traditional and modern forms of homonegativity, although this occurred through differential emphases on specific moral foundations. Our findings suggest that the more participants regarded the individual rather than the group (e.g., family or society) as the focus of moral concern, the less likely they were to evidence either type of homonegativity. MFT appears to provide the sexual prejudice literature with a means of understanding the motivational schema of Christian and other conservatives in less derogatory terms than have heretofore been examined. This can enhance the study of homonegativity and the public policy that flows from it.

The complex relationship between religion and prejudice has interested researchers since the 1940s. However, this literature has been dominated by a focus on personality dimensions (e.g., authoritarianism), cognitive styles (e.g., need for cognition), and religiosity (e.g., intrinsic religious orientation and fundamentalism). We are unaware of a single study that has utilized insights from the field of moral psychology to examine attitudes toward homosexuality, despite the fact that the subject of sexual behavior carries an undeniable moral dimension and moral authority may be the strongest predictor of attitudes toward homosexulity (Whitehead & Baker, 2012). In order to extend the application of this field to the sexual prejudice literature, we turned to one of the major theories in moral psychology for understanding how people make moral evaluations--Moral Foundations Theory (MFT).

Moral Foundations Theory

MFT integrates anthropological and evolutionary accounts of morality to identify and explain the standards by which people formulate their moral standpoints and values (Graham, Haidt, 6c Nosek, 2009; Haidt, 2012). It identifies five foundations from which moral values originate.1 The first two foundations are Harm/Care (comprising virtues related to compassion and concern for the suffering of others) and Fairness/Reciprocity (comprising virtues related to justice and equality) (Haidt, Graham, & Joseph, 2009). These foundations are termed the individualizingfoundations, because of their emphasis on the rights and welfare of individuals (Graham, Haidt, & Nosck; 2009). The remaining three foundations are termed binding foundations because of their emphasis on virtues and institutions that bind people into roles, duties, and mutual obligations (Graham, et al., 2011). These foundations are identified as Ingroup/Loyalty (comprising virtues related to allegiance, constancy, conformity, and self-sacrifice), Authority/Respect (comprising virtues related to social order, adherence to class structure, respect, obedience, and role fulfillment), and Purity/Sanctity (comprising virtues related to chastity, wholesomeness, control of desires, and avoidance of physical and spiritual contamination) (Haidt et al., 2009).

These researchers have found consistent empirical support for the tendency of people whom self-identify as liberal to place a strong emphasis on the Harm/Care and Fairness/Reciprocity individualizing foundations (Graham et al. 2009; Haidt et al. 2009). Liberals therefore tend to justify moral rules in terms of their consequences for individuals. They tend to support the use of government programs or changing social institutions to extend individual rights as widely and equally as possible. The language of rights, equality, and social justice tends to be the dominant parlance of moral argumentation among those on the left. Conservative persons, on the other hand, extend their moral domain beyond harm and fairness to give relatively equal weight to the binding moral foundations of In-group/Loyalty, Authority/Respect, and Purity/ Saneticy. Haidt and colleagues (2009) have found that con servatives tend to build their moral sentiment equally on all five foundations, having less focus on the first two foundations than liberals but more emphasis on the other three. Thus, conservatives balance their con cerns for harm and fairness with social cohesion, institutional integrity, and divinity concerns. They generally believe the institutions, norms, and traditions that have helped build civilizations contain the accumulated wisdom of human experience and should not be tinkered with apart from immense reflection and caution. Haidt and Graham (2007) have summarized this sociopolitical divide by suggesting that while justice and related virtues based on the fairness foundation make up 50% of the moral world for liberals, they comprise only 20% of it for conservatives.

MFT can be employed to explain differences in chinking between these two groups toward homosexuality in the following manner. Liberals are likely to see acceptance of homosexuality as being an egalitarian response (Fairness/Reciprocity) and as being supportive of the emotional well-being of lesbians and gay men (Harm/Care). Religious conservatives, on the other hand, while not unconcerned with issues of fairness and harm, have to balance these moral considerations with the binding moral foundations. Thus, they would be more inclined to see lesbians and gay men as a community of individuals who engage in immoral or unnatural behavior (Purity/Sanctity), act against religious and cultural traditions (Authority/Respect), and who have embraced a different set of cultural values (Ingroup/Loyalty).

Intrinsic Religiosity and Homonegativity

While to our knowledge no previous research has specifically examined the relationship between how people derive their moral compass and homonegativity, some intersecting literature does exist. Allport (1966) attempted to better understand the multifaceted relationship between religion and prejudice by developing a theory of religious experience and motivation that distinguished between intrinsic and extrinsic religious orientation. He defined extrinsically motivated religious persons as those who use their religion for their own ends to provide security, comfort, sociability, distraction, status, and self-justification, etc. On die other hand, believers who display intrinsic religiousness (IR) find their "master motive" in religion and therefore internalize and live their religion (Allport, 1966; Allport & Ross, 1967).

It has been suggested that some forms of prejudice such as racism are religiously proscribed; whereas, other prejudices such as negative attitudes towards lesbians and gay men are permitted or even encouraged among certain religions (Duck & Hunsberger, 1999). Whitley (2009) confirmed this pattern across studies, wherein greater IR was associated with higher homosexual prejudice and lower racial/ethnic prejudice. However, another meta-analysis specific to racial prejudice did not find a clear relationship between IR and greater racial tolerance (Hall, Matz, & Wood, 2010). These authors suggested that strong in-group identity, along with basic life values of social conformity and respect for tradition, are likely factors in religiously based racial prejudice. In addition, IR has been most strongly related to the civil rights concerns and stereotypic be lief aspects of homonegativity. Given the fairly robust association between IR and attitudes toward lesbians and gay men, it would appear sensible to account tor IR in assessing for potentially unique relationships be tween moral foundations and homonegativity.

The Evolution of Homonegativity

The assessment of attitudes toward lesbians and gay men has evolved significantly in the past quarter century. Most of the early attempts to operationalize and study homonegativity have involved measures that reflect overt expressions of prejudice, now termed traditional or old-fashioned homonegativity (Morrison & Morrison, 2002). Old-fashioned homonegativity is grounded in objections to and misconceptions about lesbians and gay men based on religious or moral judgments. The most well known of these instruments is the Attitudes Toward Lesbians and Gay Men (ATLG) scale (Herek, 1988,1998), which includes items such as, "Homosexuality is a sin," and "Homosexuals should not be allowed to work with children."

Although the ATLG scale is still frequently utilized by researchers, there has been a growing recognition that the rapid evolution of social norms regarding homosexuality may now limit the ability of old-fashioned measures of homonegativity to capture the more covert and subtle prejudices that may continue to exist. Instruments have now been developed to address this problem of modern homonegativity, most notably the Modern Homonegativity Scale (MHS) (Morrison, Kenny, & Harrington, 2005; Morrison & Morrison, 2002), which is operationalized so as to not emphasize biological or characterological inferiority but rather beliefs that sexual minorities are pursing undeserved gains in society. Items on the MHS include, "Gay men (Lesbian women) have become har too confrontational in their demand for equal rights," and "Many gay men (lesbian women) use their sexual orientation so that they can obtain special privileges." With modern homonegativity the assumption is that lesbians and gay men have ail the rights they need and should stop asking for more.

Whitley (2009) indicated that most studies of the relationship between religiosity and homonegativity have assessed attitudes toward homosexuals rather than specifically identifying lesbian and gay identities. Since many people are likely to interpret "homosexuals" as referring to gay men, Whitley cautioned that the findings in the relevant literature may be more applicable to gay men than to lesbians and he has recommended assessing homonegativity separately for lesbians and gay men (Kite & Whitley, 1996). In addition, research has suggested that both sexes have displayed more negative views of gay men than lesbians (Stefurak, Taylor, & Mehta, 2010). Given these concerns, we felt that the most robust test of any relationship between MFT and homonegativity would assess both modern and old-fashioned homonegativity and restrict the reference group to gay men.

The Present Study

The sexual prejudice research has generally examined the relationship of homonegativity with dispositional traits, such as openness to experience or disgust sensitivity, and developmental adaptations, such as attachment styles or defense mechanisms. These have been measured with little regard for the broader context of how individuals construct their identities. There has been a concomitant neglect in this literature of factors pertaining to personal meaning or identity (Haidt, et al., 2009; McAdams, 1995). To our knowledge no work has been undertaken that focuses on the potential role of moral intuitions, which are the innate psychological systems out of which moral judgments automatically arise. The present study was therefore conducted as an initial attempt to determine the extent to which the moral foundations ot MFT may relate to homonegativity toward gay men. Our literature review offered many considerations in choosing how to conduct this study, including the particular association of IR with civil rights concerns and the distinction between old-fashioned and modern homonegativity. Multiple regression analysis therefore appeared to be an appropriate method for controlling IR when predicting both varieties of homonegativity and therefore provided a more stringent test of our expectations. We predicted that: (1) IR would be positively and separately related to homonegativity, (2) accounting for moral intuitions, especially as represented in the binding foundations, would account for additional variance in explaining homonegativity toward gay men and, more specifically, (3) that individualizing moral foundations would be negatively related to homonegativity while the binding foundations would be positively related to homonegativity.

Method

Participants

Participants for this study included undergraduate students at a private Christian university in central California. This university has a distinctly Protestant and Mennonite history and identity but it accepts students from a variety of Christian traditions as well as those having no religious background. Data were collected in March and April of 2011 from 191 participants. Due to missing data, 8 questionnaires could not be utilized, leaving a final sample of 183. This sample consisted of 133 women (72.7%) and 50 men (27.3%), with a mean age of 20.6 (SD = 3.4). The average age of participants was 20.6 years (SD = 3.4). Participants who identified themselves as White comprised approximately half of the sample (n = 93, 50.8%), with the second largest group identifying as Hispanic (n = 60, 32.8 %). The remainder of the sample identified themselves as biracial (n = 14, 7.7%), Black (n = 5, 2.7%), Asian (n = 5, 2.7%), and other (n = 6,3.3%). The highest level of education attained (eight response options) by at least one parent was used as a proxy for SES. This indicator revealed that 47 (25.8%) participants had parents with no greater than a high school diploma, 94 (51.4%) reported at least one parent with college experience and/or degree, and 41 (42.4%) had a parent with graduate school experience and/or degree.

Materials

Moral Foundations Questionnaire (MFQ). The MFQ (Graham, et al., 2011) consists of two 15-item parts. Participants first rated the moral relevance of foundation-specific concerns to their moral judgments using a 6-point scale anchored by "not at all relevant" and "extremely relevant" (e.g., "When you decide whether something is right or wrong, to what extent do you consider whether or not someone was harmed?"). In the second part, they indicated their level of agreement (on a 6-point scale) with more specific and contextualized moral statements such as "Loyalty to one's group is more important than one's individual concerns"--Ingroup, or "I would call some acts wrong on the grounds that they are unnatural"--Purity. The Purity items obtained a reliability of .74. Due to low reliabilities (.47 to .58) in the remaining foundations, we combined the Harm/Care and Fairness/Reciprocity items to form a single variable and did likewise with the Ingroup/Loyalty and Authority/Respect items. We were thus able to more reliably examine the individual-4 izing foundations and the remaining binding foundations, obtaining alphas of .71 for both Harm/Fairness and Ingroup/Authority. Given our predictions, such a three-factor model of the MFQ can be appropriately utilized (Haidt, personal communication, 5/17/11).

Intrinsic Religious Orientation. Intrinsic religious orientation was measured using the 8 intrinsic items of the Intrinsic/Extrinsic-Revised Scale (Gorsuch & McPherson, 1989). Participants responded on a nine point scale, with higher scores indicating greater intrinsic religiousness (1 = strongly disagree and 9 = strongly agree). Tine original scale contains 14 items (6 measure extrinsic orientation, 8 measure intrinsic orientation), but since we were specifically interested in measuring intrinsic religious orientation, we removed all of the items measuring extrinsic orientation. For example, participants answered questions such as "I try hard to live all my life according to my religious beliefs." In our study, the alpha for IR was .83.

Homonegativity. In accordance with our aforementioned reasoning, homonegativity was measured in two ways. The 10-item subscale of Hereks (1998) Attitudes Toward Lesbians and Gay Men Scale, Revised Version (ATLG-R), was used to assess respondents' traditional or "old-fashioned" attitudes toward gay men (ATG). Because the ability of the ATLG to accurately capture prejudice toward homosexuals has been questioned given the changing cultural views pertaining to sexual minorities, we also employed the 10-item gay men form--the Modern Homonegativity Scale (HMS-G; Morrison & Morrison, 2002). Each item (e.g., "Male homosexuality is a perversion" for the ATG, and "If gay men want to be treated like everyone else then they need to stop making such a fuss about their sexuality and culture" for the HMS-G) was rated on a 9-point scale, ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 9 (strongly agree). Higher scores indicate more unfavorable attitudes toward gay men. Prior research has found reliabilities for the HMS-G to be approximately .85 and slightly greater than this for die ATG. In the present sample, the Cronbach's alpha was .90 for the ATG and .93 for the MHS-G.

Social Desirability. We utilized the 5-item Socially Desirable Response Set Measure (SDRS-5; Hays, Hayashi, & Stewart, 1989) to assess impression management. The SDRS-5 consists of five items from the Marlowe-Crowne Form A (Reynolds, 1982) that obtained the highest item-to-total correlations (e.g., "I sometimes (-eel resentful when I don't get my way"). Participants responded on a 5-point scale ranging from 1 (definitely true) to 5 (definitely false). Extreme answers suggest socially desirable responding and are scored as 1 while all other responses are scored as 0.

Procedure

After gaining advanced permission from the university IRB and teachers, students were given the opportunity to participate in our study during regular class meeting times (the majority of classes were psychology classes, with the exception of one sociology class and one history class). They were told that they would be answering a questionnaire assessing their attitudes and moral beliefs regarding several contemporary social issues. Each student who chose to participate received a raffle ticket, with the opportunity to win one or two gift cards at the conclusion ol the class period. These incentives helped ensure that the response rate was close to 100% of students in attendance at each class. Surveys took approximately 25 minutes to complete.

Results

Means, standard deviations, and bivariate correlations for all continuous variables are presented in Table 1. Of the demographic variables, SES, Age and Social Desirability, as measured by the SDRS-5, were related to ATG while SES and Social Desirability were associatcd with MHS-G. In addition, t-tests revealed a significant effect of Ethnicity for ATG, (t(181) = -9.52, p < .003, 95% CI [-15.83, -3.20]) with Hispanic students (M = 41.53, SD = 19.65) displaying less homonegativity than the other, mostly White, students (M = 51.05, SD = 20.62).

TABLE 1

Means, Standard Deviations, and Interrcorrelations for Outcome and
Predictor Measures (N = 183)

Measure    M      SD       1      2       3       4       5       6

1. ATG          47.93  20.75    --

2.       51.73  20.34    .79    --
MHS-G                    ***

3. Age   20.59   3.38  .16 *   .14    --

4. SES    4.69   2.30    .20   .18   .01    --
                          **     *

5.        1.16   1.14   -.18  -.18   .03  -.15    --
SDRS-5                     *     *           *

6. IR    51.78  12.87    .59   .46   .07   .25  -.13    --
                         ***   ***         ***

7. H/F   44.73   6.83   -.15  -.15  -.09  -.25   .14  -.02
                                 *         ***

8. I/A   39.84   7.31    .21   .26   .05  -.08  -.01   .15
                          **   ***                       *

9. P/S   19.81   5.25    .45   .37   .12   .04  -.19   .42
                         ***   ***                **   ***

Measure   7    8   9

1. ATG

2.
MHS-G

3. Age

4. SES

5.
SDRS-5

6. IR

7. H/F    --

8. I/A   .33   --
         ***

9. P/S   .31  .51  --
          **   **

Note.N = 182 for Age andSES. ATG = Attitudes Toward Gay men; MHS-G
= Modern Homonegativitv Scale - Gay men; SDRS-5 = Socially
Desirable Response Set Measure; IR = Intrinsic Religiousness; H/F =
Harm/Fairness moral foundations; I/A = Ingroup/Authority moral
foundations; Purity/Sanctity moral foundation.

* p <.05. ** p < 0.01. *** p <.001.

Univariate analyses further indicated that skewness values were below 1.5 for all variables except Age. Inverse transformation reduced skew for Age to a similar level. We tested separate hierarchical regression models for each of the outcome variables ATG and MHS-G. To test our initial prediction, we first entered the significantly related control variables as a block (SES, Age, Ethnicity, and SDRS-5, for ATG; SES and SDRS-5 for MHS-G), followed by the inclusion of IR in a second step. To test our second and third predictions, we entered in consecutive steps as follows: (1) the relevant control variables as a block, (2) IR, and (3) the moral foundation variables as a block. All analyses were conducted using SPSS 18.0 for Windows. Collinearity statistics (as evidenced in tolerance and YTF values) indicated that multicollinearity was not a problem with our dataset. Durbin-Watson coefficient confirmed the independence of the observations. Examination of residuals indicated that linearity conditions were met and found no indication of homoscedasticity.

Consistent with existent literature, we found support for our first prediction, in that after controlling for demographic variables and Social Ddesirability, IR predicted both ATG ([R.sup.2] = .37, adjusted [R.sup.2] = .36, F(5, 175) = 20.83, p < .001), and MHS-G ([R.sup.2] = .22, adjusted [R.sup.2] = .21, F(5, 175) = 16.93, p < .001). Our second prediction, that adding moral intuitions to the model would account for significant explanatory variance over and above the control variables and IR, was also supported (Tables 2 and 3). The full model was predictive of both ATG ([R.sup.2] = .46, adjusted [R.sup.2] = .44, F(8, 172) = 18.34, p < .001), and MHS-G ([R.sup.2] = .32, adjusted [R.sup.2] = .30,F(6,175) = 13.93, p < .001). Adding the moral foundations improved model fit for ATG, [DELTA][R.sup.2] = .09, p < .001, due to a positive association with Purity/Sanctity and an inverse relationship with Harm/Fairness. Hie addition of the moral foundations similarly improved model fit for MHS-G, [DELTA][R.sup.2] = .10, p < .001, though in this model all three moral foundation variables contributed to the added predictive ability, with Ingroup/Authority and Purity/Sanctity being positively related and Harm/Fairness inversely correlated.

Table 2

Hierarchical Regression Analysis Predicting ATG with Demographic,
IR, and Moral Foundation Variables (N = 181)

Step and     B       SEB      [beta]   [R.sup.2]   [DELTA]
predictor                                       [R.sup.2]
variable

Step 1                                  .10 **     .10 **

Age        240.62  200.60       .07

SES          -.06     .56      -.01

Ethnicity   -3.51    2.70      -.08

SDRS-5       -.76    1.87      -.02

Step 2                                  .37***     .28***

IR            .69     .10   .43 ***

Step 3                                 .46 ***    .09 ***

H/F          -.72     .20  -.24 ***

I/A           .22     .19       .08

P/S          1.15     .30   .29 ***

Note. ATG = Attitudes Toward Gay men; Ethnicity = Hispanic vs. ail
other ethnicities; SDRS-5 = Socially Desirable Response Set
Measure; IR = Intrinsic Religiousness; H/F = Harm/Fairness moral
foundations; I/A = Ingroup/Authority moral foundations; P/S =
Purity/Sancriry moral foundation.

** p <.01. *** p <.001.

Table 3

Heirarchial Regression Analysis Predicting MHS-G with Demographic,
IR, and Moral Foundation Variables (N= 182)

Step and     B    SEB    [beta]   [R.sup.2]   [DELTA]
predictor                                    [R.sup.2]
variable

Step 1                               .05 **     .05 **

SES          .12   .59       .01

SDRS-5     -1.87  2.01      -.06

Step 2                               .22 **    .17 ***

IR           .53   .11   .33 ***

Step 3                              .32 ***    .10 ***

H/F         -.78   .21  -.26 ***

I/A          .56   .21    .20 **

P/S          .75   .32     .19 *

Note. MHS-G = Modern Homonegariviry Scale--Gay men; SDRS-5 =
Socially Desirable Response Set Measure; IR = Intrinsic
Religiousness; H/F = Harm/Fairness moral foundations; I/A =
Ingroup/Authority moral foundations; P/S = Purity/Sanctity moral
foundation.

* p <.05. ** p <.0l. *** p <.001.

This pattern of association for both models is generally supportive of our third prediction, that participants with higher scores for the individualizing foundations would display lower ATG and MHS-G, while those with higher scores for the binding foundations would tend to endorse higher ATG and MHS-G. Finally, while not a part of our predictions, we think it worth mentioning that additional analyses found no interaction effects between centered predictor variables IR and any of the moral foundations.

Discussion

Our results suggest that assessing moral intuitions can aid our understanding of homonegativity's meaning amongst Christian and other conservatives, though not to the exclusion of established factors such as IR. Our first prediction, that IR would be positively related to both traditional and modern forms of homonegativity, was confirmed. The association of homonegativity with IR was only modestly attenuated by the addition of the moral intuitions for both ATG and MHS-G. This finding is consistent with a large body of literature indicating that intrinsically or conservatively religious individuals tend to have less affirming attitudes toward gay men than persons who report being less conservatively or religiously oriented (Whitley, 2009).

The findings pertinent to our second and third predictions, however, suggest that simply assessing for religiosity is not sufficient to fully comprehend the motivations that give rise to lower levels of affirmation for gay men among conservatives. Consistent with our predictions, the inclusion of moral intuitions significantly improved model fit for both ATG and MHS-G. Moreover, the pattern of association between the moral intuitions and both measures of homonegativity was generally as predicted and suggests that intuitive concerns about harm and fairness to individuals are associated with less homonegativity while worries about social functioning as captured in the Ingroup/Authority and Purity/Sanctity intuitions are related to greater homonegativity.

The differential patterns of association we found for Ingroup/Authority and Purity/Sanctity with both measures of homonegativity may be explained by the differences in item content between ATG and MHS-G. The focus of ATG on judgments related to morality and naturalness appeared not to tap participants' intuitions concerning loyalty toward their group or the respect of social roles and obligations, as the Ingroup/Authority intuitions were not significantly related to ATG. Instead, the Purity/Sanctity intuition was the moral foundation most strongly associated with ATG, suggesting the ATG items pull for moral intuitions that express concerns for social functioning associated with self-control, the natural order, and wholesome living. It is important to mention our findings support the view that Purity/Sanctity concerns cannot be reduced to religious belief or practice, as this moral foundation remained highly correlated with ATG even after accounting tor IR. Prior research has implicated the propensity to experience disgust as an animating factor in the Purity/Sanctity foundation (Inbar, Pizarro, & Bloom, 2009, 2012; Ritter & Preston, 2011), although our findings and MFT theory suggest it would be a mistake to view homonegativity simply in terms of disgust (Haidt et al., 2009).

When the measure of homonegativity focused on participants' attitudes regarding the expansion of civil rights for gay men (i.e., MHS-G), Ingroup/Authority intuitions became significant predictors along with the Purity/Sanctity intuition. The MHS-G items therefore appeared to make intuitive concerns related to die obligations of group membership and the proper order of social relationships much more salient for participants than what was evident with the ATG. The In-group/Authority intuitions complemented but did not replace the activation of participants' concerns about the control of desires and physical and spiritual contagion, as indicated by the continued association of the Purity/Sanctity intuition with MHS-G.

Koleva, Graham, Haidt, Iyer, and Ditto (2012) asserted that Purity/Sanctity is the best moral foundation for predicting disapproval of sexuality related issues. Our results suggest this statement may need to be qualified to account for how homonegativity is opera-tionalized. While Koleva et al.'s conclusion held true for predicting ATG, both Harm/Fairness and Ingroup/Authority intuitions correlated more strongly with MHS-G than did Puritv/Sanctity concerns. Thus, the emphasis that conservatives place on the Ingroup/Authority moral intuitions may be activated more when predicting modern, rights-based definitions of homonegativity dian when assessing for more old-fashioned concepts of homonegativity based in religious and traditional beliefs.

Research and Policy Considerations

Our findings carry important implications for how research in this area is both conducted and translated into public policy. While the present results validate the role that religious orientation may play in homonegativity, we also believe they support a need for greater consideration of moral intuitions in the future development of this literature. We see a number of reasons for this inclusion. First, the utilization of insights from MFT can help to broaden our understanding of homonegativity by moving the discussion beyond causes that might be considered personal deficits or hostilities to motivations that could be considered individual differences and therefore carry a less pejorative tone. Generally speaking, research on attitudes toward lesbians and gay men seems to equate less affirmation with an implicit anti-gay sentiment, believed to be derived from such factors as closed-minded, dogmatic, and authoritarian cognitive styles (Hall, Matz, tk Ward, 2010; Johnson, Laboiuff, Rowatt, Patock-Peck-ham, & Carlisle, 2011), resistance to change (Jost, Glaser, Kruglanski, & Sulloway, 2003), rigid moralization (Johnson, et al., 2012), moral sanctimoniousness (Leak & Finken, 2011), and even an immature faith (Leak & Randall, 1995). Such characteristics may be broadly applied to Christian conservatives, even though evidence exists that some of these individuals do make nuanced assessments related to lesbians and gay men (Basset, et al., 2005; Fulton, Gorsuch, & Maynard, 1999; Rosik, 2007a; Rosik, Griffith, & Cruz, 2007). In addition, as our findings suggest, homonegativity by some Christian conservatives may be more a function of perceived value violations than a prejudice toward sexual orientation minority status per se (Chambers, Schlcnker, & Collison, 2012; Wetherell, Brandt, & Reyna, 2013).

We believe our findings support a conceptualization of homonegativity that adds a less derogatory and more complete attributional framework to the concerns Christian and other conservatives may be expressing. The lesser emphasis on harm and fairness by some participants may reflect not an intrinsic anti-gav outlook but rather a set of moral intuitions that places a greater stress on the well-being of-groups such as the family and society (Graham, et a., 2011). Similarly, the association of homonegativity with a greater concern tor purity and sanctity might not reflect a desire to im pose theocracy, but a sense of the value of historic religious traditions in constraining sexual behavior and promoting self-control for the betterment of families and societies. More conservative Christian participants may have often felt the pull of their concerns for harm and fairness, but were unable to endorse these moral sentiments as highly as did those participants who felt less concern about the binding foundations. MFT theory suggests char liberals may fail to appreciate the extent to which the issues involving homosexuality are morally conflicting for conservatives (Haidt & Graham, 2007), and this conflict may be reflected in our findings.

Our point is not to argue that Christian and other conservatives are always correct in how they apply their moral sentiments, but to simply acknowledge a validity to their concerns that is not well represented in the current literature. Graham, et al. (2009) cautioned that differences in moral thinking between liberals and conservatives are not necessarily a matter of right or wrong, but rather a difference in opinions about what considerations have moral relevance and the degree of that relevance. We therefore believe that the study of sexual prejudice would benefit from a respectful acknowledgment and consideration of conservatives' concerns in studying this important subject, and our findings suggest that incorporating MFT could be an effective way of achieving this goal (c.f. Haidt & Graham, 2007).

Another rationale for considering MFT in researching homonegativity is that using this lens can broaden the level of analysis so that it includes the research endeavor itself. Psychological science, particularly in its academic representation, tends to be a sociopolitically liberal endeavor in addressing controversial social issues (Redding, 2001, 2012). In the research pertaining to social issues in general and the study of homonegativity and sexual prejudice in particular, there appears to be a tendency to reject conservative concerns relative to in-group loyalty, respect for authority, and purity as "bad" when they conflict with the "good" moralities of harm and fairness (Haidt & Graham, 2007). This may occur in both the construction of measurements and in the interpretation of findings (Emler, Rennick, & Malone, 1983; Needham-Penrosc & Freidman, 2012; O'Donahue & Caselles, 1993; Rosik, 2007a/2007b; Slife & Reber, 2009; Watson, et al., 2003). MFT suggests that such oversight does not derive from conscious bias, but rather from the inability of many researchers to recognize conservative concerns as valid moral concerns. Instead they are often seen as obstacles to an individualized morality understood largely in terms of harm and fairness (Graham, et al., 2009). Haidt (Tierney, 2011) suggested that social psychology constitutes a "tribal-moral community" united by "sacred values" and this lack of diversity can hinder research and damage its credibility among non-liberals. This critique may well be germane to all of academic psychology. MFT can promote healthy self-reflection within the field ot psychology, such that the study of sexual prejudice might increasingly acknowledge the validity of conservatives' binding moral intuitions while continuing to contribute to the well-being of lesbians and gay men.

Finally, MFT can benefit the study of homonegativity by providing insights and a way of conceptualizing the data that might enhance the receptivity of conservatives to public policy in this area. Doubtless few conservative Christians or other social conservatives will warm to policy statements and legislative efforts that implicitly or explicitly view their concerns solely as the product of cognitive rigidity or religiously-based hatred toward sexual minorities. Haidt and Graham (2009) remind us that the binding foundations are not meant to destroy the human spirit but rather are moral concerns that many cultures have relied upon to build structures that give lives order, value, and meaning. In fact, the heavy emphasis on the harm and fairness foundations of modern western societies is the exception rather than the rule among cultures historically and today (Haidt, 2012; Haidt & Graham, 200"; Heinrich, Heine, Norenzayan, 2010). MFT provides policymakers and mental health associations wishing to reduce homonegativity and sexual prejudice a way to craft legislation and initiatives in a manner more palatable to the moral tastes of Christian and other conservatives in North American and around the world. For example, emphasizing the references to harm and fairness concerns tound in religious scriptures and national or state constitutions would have some appeal to conservatives provided they do not perceive policy initiatives related to homosexuality as seriously undermining the equally valued purposes of the binding foundations. Where such conflict does occur, judicious policy makers could provide extensive conscience exemptions that recognize the moral importance to many conservative Christians of religious group loyalty, traditional sources of authority, and sexual as well as spiritual purity and self-control.

While conservatives and liberals are not likely to agree on all aspects ot how the sexual prejudice literature should be translated into public policy, accounting for the diversity of moral foundations may be a realistic path for finding greater common ground and promoting civil discourse within the culture regarding homosexuality (for example, see Wilson (2008) as regards same-sex marriage). Finding mutually agreeable solutions today would provide some policy resilience in the face of cultural forces that could impact the relationship of religion and homonegativity in the future (Whitley, 2009). For example, a broadly perceived threat, such as that of serious social disintegration, might enhance the general appeal of the binding foundations and change current cultural momentum for the expansion of gay rights toward a more restrictive direction. "Recognizing ingroup, authority, and purity as moral concerns," Haidt and Graham (2007) exhort, 14--even if they are not your moral concerns--is crucial for both scientific accuracy and for the application of social justice research beyond the walls of die academy" (p. 111).

Limitations

Limitations to our study include the convenience sample of college age students, so that generalization to other populations and age cohorts cannot be assumed. For example, older cohorts who experienced much less exposure to lesbians and gay men during their early adulthood would conceivably show stronger associations among our variables than those found tor our participants. The larger portion of women in our study is also a limitation, although the generally lower levels of homonegativity among women (Stefurak, Taylor, & Mehta, 2010) suggest a degree of robustness to our findings. Reliabilities tor the MFQ subscales were somewhat low, raising the possibility that some findings pertaining to these variables may have been missed due to a lack of measurement precision. MFQ subscale analyses also revealed that Purity/Sanctity scores displayed greater variance than participants scores on the other subscales, suggesting that range restriction may also have played a role.

While psychometrically justified and conceptually permitted, our decision to combine the Harm/Care and Fairness/Reciprocity foundations as well as the In-group/Loyalty and Authority/Respect foundations may have prevented us from achieving more finely tuned insights regarding the interplay between the moral foundations and homonegativity. Auxiliary analyses utilizing the five separate foundations suggested that Harm/Care might be more influential than Fairness/Reciprocity in accounting for ATG while the reverse appeared true for MHS-G; however, the unreliable assessment ot these intuitions makes such conclusions speculative at best. Finally, we did not examine attitudes toward other sexual minorities such as lesbians or bisexual men. Although we felt the literature provided some basis for restricting our reference population to gay men, we recognize our findings may well be different tor other sexual minorities. We would encourage further research on this question utilizing the full range ok moral foundations as well as more sophisticated statistical procedures such as SEM.

Conclusion

Keeping these limitations in mind, our findings provided consistent support for the value of-assessing moral intuitions in understanding homonegativity. We identified expected associations between intrinsic religious orientation and old-fashioned and modern homonegativity. Li addition, inclusion of the moral foundations significantly improved fit for both models. Harm/Fairness intuitions were negatively associated and Purity/Sanctity concerns were positively related with both ATG and MHS-G. Differences in the opera-tionalization of homonegativity appear to have resulted in the Lngroup/Authority intuitions being unrelated to ATG but positively associated with MHS-G.

Since our models controlled for demographics, impression management, and IR, we suspect that our findings constitute a reasonably conservative test of the value MFT may provide in understanding homonegativity and sexual prejudice, hi general terms, our findings suggest that the more participants regarded the individual rather than the group as the focus of moral concern, the less likely they were to evidence homonegativity. While religious orientation plays an important role in understanding sexual prejudice, we believe our results provide sufficient reason to expand the development of theory to include insights from moral psychology, particularly as represented by MFT. By drawing attention to the legitimate moral emphases that exist at both ends of the sociopolitical spectrum, MFT provides the sexual prejudice literature with a means of validating the moral intuitions of Christian and other conservatives without sacrificing its present emphasis on harm and fairness. We believe that adding non-pejorative attributions to the motivational schema of conservatives can enhance the study of homonegativity and the public policy that flows from it.

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(1.) MFT theory has recently added a sixth moral foundation termed Liberty/Oppression (Haidt, 2012; Iyer, Koleva, Graham, Ditto, & Haidt, 2012). This foundation is about the feelings of reactance and resentment people fed toward those who dominate them and restrict their liberty. Its intuitions are often in tension with those of the authority foundation. The Liberty/Oppression foundation is most highly endorsed by persons who identify as political libertarians and is associated with a dispositional lack of emotionality and a preference for weaker or less-binding social relationships. The MFT assessment instrument available at the time of our study did not include items for Liberty/Oppression and therefore we were unfortunately not able to examine its potential associations with homonegativity.

Christopher H. Rosik Link Care Center & Fresno Pacific University Laura J. Dinges and Noe Saavedra Fresno Pacific University

The authors would like to acknowledge Pcrer Hill, Jonathan Haidt, Gary Welton, and Richard Gorsuch for their helpful input on an earlier version of this article.

Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Christopher H. Rosik, Link Care Center, 1734 W. Shaw Ave., Fresno, CA, 93711. E-mail: christophcrrosik@Imkcare.org

Author Information

ROSIK, CHRISTOPHER H. Ph.D. Address: 1734 W. Shaw Ave.. Fresno. CA 93711. Title: Psychologist, Director of Research. Degrees: PhD (Clinical Psychology) Fuller Theological Seminary. Specializations: Missions, Dissociative Disorders, Human Sexuality, Religion and Prejudice.

DINGES, LAURA J. Address: 485 W Nees Ave #207, Fresno, CA 93. Degrees: Working toward an MA (Social Work) California State University. Fresno, CA; BA (Psychology) Fresno Pacific University. Specializations: minored in Peacemaking and Conflict Studies at FPU.

SAAVEDRA, NOE. Address: 322 E Clinton Ave, Fresno, CA 93704. Degree: BA (Psychology) Fresno Pacific Univeristy.