Assessing societal attitudes’ and laws’ independent associations with sexual minority disclosure behaviors

Sexual minorities (i.e., lesbian women, gay men, and bi/pansexual people) are uniquely challenged with deciding when to disclose their socially stigmatized identity. The current investigation examines how a country’s structural support (i.e., laws and policies related to sexual minorities) and interpersonal tolerance (i.e., public opinion regarding sexual minorities) factor into sexual minorities’ decision to disclose. Study 1 examined a representative population sample (n = 114,098) and found that willingness to spontaneously disclose sexual minority status was predicted by interpersonal tolerance to a moderate degree and structural support to a small degree. Study 2 replicated these findings in a community sample of sexual minorities (n = 93,079), using a dimensional measure of disclosure across contexts. Furthermore, exploratory indirect effects analyses found that these contextual factors impacted disclosure via respondents’ perceptions of their environment. Taken together, the current investigation highlights how sexual minorities assess their environments and manage their public identities accordingly.