ABSTRACT

For over a century, homosexuality was treated as mental illness by practitioners who employed a variety of therapeutic approaches to “cure” it. The psychological research of Hooker (1957) challenged this position by demonstrating that there were no differences between nonclinical samples of homosexual males and heterosexual males on projective test responses and that experts on these measures could not tell them apart. Other such studies followed and these studies formed the basis for what is now referred to as lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) psychology. In 1973, the American Psychiatric Association (APA) removed homosexuality from its list of mental disorders (American Psychiatric Association, 1974). In 1975, the APA adopted a resolution stating that “homosexuality per se implies no impairment in judgment, stability, reliability, or general social or vocational capabilities” (Conger, 1975, p. 633).