INCIDENCE OF BISEXUAL FEELINGS AND OPPOSITE SEX BEHAVIOR IN MEDICAL-STUDENTS

There is evidence that a significant minority of men in Western society have had some homosexual experience. It has been argued that this behavior does not usually result from sexual attraction to members of the same sex. One hundred and thirty-eight male and 58 female medical students answered an anonymous questionnaire investigating their awareness of heterosexual and homosexual feelings and their sex-dimorphic behavior and gender identity in childhood and adolescence. About 60 per cent of the students reported that they were aware of some homosexual feelings at adolescence, and over 40 per cent were still aware of such feelings. There was a significant association in males between the presence of homosexual feelings and female sex-dimorphic behavior and gender identity. This association has been found in previous studies but has been rejected as not representative of homosexuality in the toted population, as the homosexuals in these studies were patients or drawn from special groups, such as homosexual organizations, and the heterosexual controls were drawn from different groups. The presence of the association between female sex-dimorphic behavior and gender identity and male homosexuality in this study was considered evidence of the validity of the association and of the honesty of the subjects answering the questionnaire. The relevance of the incidence of bisexual feelings found in this study to evidence for the current biological theory of the etiology of homosexuality is discussed. © 1979 by The Williams & Wilkins Co.