Post a response:
|
Thank you for the study. There are a few questions that have come up for me after skimming through it: "For instance, this sample may represent an especially distressed sample, since these individuals were participating on a forum for those seeking support." This assumption makes sense to me, though I fear there are many factors which speak for the study's sample maybe even having a particularly good mental health in comparison to a more representative one. To name just one, the main reason for my suspicion is that participants were required to be 18 or older. So a question that came to my mind was if, for example, gay teenagers/tweens have elevated rates of suicidality/loneliness compared to gay adults, and if the same could then be assumed for MAP youth compared to adult MAPs. "When I did a search for research looking at loneliness and suicidality in other populations, I couldn't find any rates that even came close." The study lists 5 populations as a comparison when discussing loneliness. Two groups that I had hoped for but that were missing are veterans and survivors, as I've seen their mental health being compared to that of gay people: “Still, even as we celebrate the scale and speed of this change, the rates of depression, loneliness and substance abuse in the gay community remain stuck in the same place they’ve been for decades. [...] 'We see gay men who have never been sexually or physically assaulted with similar post-traumatic stress symptoms to people who have been in combat situations or who have been raped,' says Alex Keuroghlian, a psychiatrist at the Fenway Institute’s Center for Population Research in LGBT Health." https://highline.huffingtonpost.com/articles/en/gay-loneliness/ When reading about such findings, I'm wondering to which extent those gay men Keuroghlian mentions happen to be MAPs or teleiophiles. In regard to your study, I'd be interested if future studies building on its findings might also look at post-traumatic stress symptoms and their relationship to loneliness with respect to MAPs. I'm also wondering if future studies are planned analyzing (if the data allows it) what e.g. differentiates the 10% of the sample with the best/worst mental health from the rest. Based on such correlations, one could perhaps figure out further what is likely especially beneficial or especially detrimental to the mental health of many MAPs. A common idea seems to be that the mental health of MAPs who are also attracted to adults is better than that of other MAPs. Is your sample able, as limited as the results may be, to make any statement about this? The mental health of the sample as a whole is worse than that of any other group you've found. But what about the, for example, 10% of the sample with the best/worse mental health? Is their mental health comparable to that of the general population or is it better or worse? |