Psychologists have named the most reliable signs of homosexuality

We all know the stereotypes. There's the unusually slender, gentle, effeminate boy who shows an interest in dolls, make-up, princesses and dresses, and has a strong aversion to rough play with boys. And there's the girl with an unfeminine build who hates perfume, loves to work with a hammer and is ready to beat up some brat.

It seems obvious that such children grow up to be homosexuals! Only recently have scientists decided to conduct research to identify the earliest and most reliable signs of homosexuality. It turns out that in this case, common sense was almost right.

The founders were psychologists Michael Bailey and Kenneth Zucker in 1995. First, they studied a lot of research on the differences in behavior between boys and girls, which exist independently, regardless of the peculiarities of upbringing and education in almost every culture.

The most important differences concern play. Boys prefer fighting with their own kind, while girls prefer the company of dolls. As for toys, the former are more interested in machine guns and jeeps, and the latter in humanoid figures (mostly with exaggerated femininity). Boys prefer to be soldiers and superheroes, while girls try on the roles of mothers, ballerinas and princesses. As a result, both sexes practically do not play with each other.

Bailey and Zucker hypothesized that future homosexuals would exhibit the opposite pattern, such that, for example, a boy would be friends with girls, be interested in his mother's cosmetics, and a girl would play hockey and watch wrestling on TV.

Testing this hypothesis may seem simple: just observe the child until he reaches the age when everything is clear. However, this method is very impractical. The fact is that homosexuals make up a very small part of society, so it would be necessary to cover a large number of children. Then there is a very long period of study (about 16 years). Finally, the topic is very delicate, because children are just children, and only those who demonstrate clearly atypical behavior start to be dragged to doctors and psychologists.

So other methods took hold. In 2008, for example, psychologist Kelly Drummond and her colleagues interviewed 25 women whose parents had turned them over to psychiatrists between the ages of three and 12. At the time, all of the girls had some symptoms of gender identity disorder, such as being friends with boys, preferring to wear men’s clothing, enjoying active play, and even refusing to sit down to go to the toilet. Although only 12 percent of these women were unable to overcome gender dysphoria (the feeling that one’s biological sex does not match one’s psychological sex), the odds of being bisexual or homosexual were 23 times higher in this group than in the general sample of young women. Not all of them became lesbians, of course, but the data suggest that lesbians often start out that way.

The same is true for gay men. Bailey and Zucker asked men about their backgrounds and found that 89% of a random sample of gay men had been friends with girls as children, etc.

Since then, numerous studies have only confirmed this conclusion. A “dose effect” was even discovered: the more a child behaves inappropriately (from the point of view of gender stereotypes), the higher the chances of subsequent homosexuality.

Cross-cultural data added to the above that pre-homosexual boys are more attracted to individual sports (swimming, cycling, tennis) than to rough and contact team sports. In addition, they are less likely to become street hooligans.

At the same time, researchers readily admit that the development of homosexuality occurs in complex ways. Not every boy who secretly put on his mother's tights becomes gay. This can also be an expression of hypersexuality. And friendship with girls can indicate that we are dealing with a future Casanova, and not a sodomite. Accordingly, homosexuality does not always arise against the background of gender dysphoria.

And here we come to the most important question. Why are parents so concerned about their child's possible sexual orientation? One might assume that people are concerned about procreation, but look at Elton John and other famous sodomites! His relatives are certainly in an extremely privileged position in terms of reproductive opportunities. Perhaps, on the contrary, it is worthwhile to develop those talents that are displayed by effeminate boys? And let them decide for themselves about their sex life...

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