Navigating the borderlands: The roles of minority stressors, bicultural self-efficacy, and cognitive flexibility in the mental health of bisexual individuals.

TLDR

The study examined how minority stressors and promotive factors relate to psychological distress and well‑being among 411 bisexual adults. Using a cross‑sectional survey, the authors assessed the relationships between prejudice, stigma expectations, internalized biphobia, outness, bicultural self‑efficacy, and cognitive flexibility with distress and well‑being. Minority stressors were associated with higher distress and lower well‑being, whereas bicultural self‑efficacy and cognitive flexibility were linked to lower distress and higher well‑being; expectations of stigma mediated the prejudice–distress/well‑being link, internalized biphobia had direct adverse effects, and cognitive flexibility moderated these associations, buffering but not fully protecting against high prejudice. The authors discuss study limitations and implications for future research and practice with bisexual populations.

Abstract

The present study examined the relations of minority stressors (i.e., experiences of prejudice, expectations of stigma, internalized biphobia, outness/concealment of bisexuality) as well as posited mental health promoters (i.e., bicultural self-efficacy, cognitive flexibility) with psychological distress and well-being in a sample of 411 bisexual people. Most of the minority stress variables were related positively with psychological distress and negatively with well-being, whereas the mental health-promoting variables were related negatively with psychological distress and positively with well-being. Results also indicated that expectations of stigma mediated the associations of antibisexual prejudice with greater distress and lower well-being, internalized biphobia was related directly with greater distress and lower well-being, and outness was linked with some costs and benefits. Moderated mediation analyses offered some evidence consistent with cognitive flexibility (but not bicultural self-efficacy) as a moderator. Specifically, within the mediation models, cognitive flexibility moderated the unique direct relation of antibisexual prejudice with psychological well-being, the relation of antibisexual prejudice with expectations of stigma, and the indirect relations of antibisexual prejudice with distress and well-being through the mediating role of expectations of stigma. These moderations were consistent with the expected buffering role of cognitive flexibility, but they also revealed that some of this buffering effect is exhausted in the context of high prejudice. Limitations of the study as well as implications for future research and practice with bisexual populations are discussed.