Page 222 - Discrimination at Work The Psychological and Organizational Bases

8. UNDERSTANDING HETEROSEXISM
191
In summary, it is important to study both direct and indirect forms of
sexual orientation discrimination from the perspective of gay and lesbian
employees and their heterosexual coworkers. A key factor in these inves­
tigations is disclosure in the workplace, which can also be measured using
multiple perspectives. This multisource approach will help disentangle the
perceptual and attributional processes that permeate reports of heterosex­
ism in the workplace. We now turn to some practical issues involved with
identifying a sample of gay and lesbian employees.
Identifying Target Populations
A key challenge in the study of sexual orientation in the workplace is ob­
taining a representative sample of gay or lesbian respondents. Although
the routine practice of surveying members of organizations is effective for
studying race and gender, this practice has limitations for gay and lesbian
employees. Those who are not out at work may be reluctant to participate
in a study of heterosexism in the workplace. They may not return surveys
or even could report that they are heterosexual, thus jeopardizing the key
variable in the study. In addition to creating unknown error variance, this
method may also introduce a response bias in that gay and lesbian employ­
ees may be more likely to return a survey on sexual orientation if they are
out at work. Because of these issues and limitations, studies of heterosex­
ism in the workplace often rely on nonprobability samples, such as using
members of gay or lesbian organizations, or rely on snowballing sampling
techniques. These samples avoid some of the problems discussed above,
but face limitations to the generalizability of findings. Herek and his col­
leagues (Herek et al., 1991) point out that these limitations can be reduced
by targeting participants from a variety of settings (i.e., gay coffeehouses,
political or religious organizations, community centers, bookstores, social
clubs, parenting groups, and student organizations). In addition, respon­
dents can be recruited through electronic or paper advertisements in gay
publications and through exit polls at voting sites in primarily gay neigh­
borhoods.
There are other issues involved with sampling gay and lesbian employ­
ees. Because most gay and lesbian employees conceal their sexual identity
to some degree at work, privacy and confidentiality become critical issues.
Martin and Knox (2000) note that gay and lesbian employees may feel
uncomfortable disclosing their sexual identity to researchers for fear that
word will spread and result in discrimination, retaliation, or even physical
harm. These fears are well grounded because it is legal in most states to
terminate an employee simply for being gay or lesbian (Herrschaft & Mills,
2002).