Is Gaydar Real?

Gaydar is an unspoken intuition that helps people recognize the sexuality of another person. But is gaydar real? The Department of Psychology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison conducted a new study to find out.

In the study researchers told one group of participants that gaydar was real. They told another group that it was a term for stereotyping. And to a third group, they mentioned nothing.

Social media profiles were then shown to participants and they judged whether they thought these men were gay or straight based on information from their profiles.

On the men’s profiles some had interests related to gay stereotypes, like fashion, shopping or theater. Other profiles had interests related to straight stereotypes like hunting, sports or cars.

This allowed researchers to assess how often people jumped to the conclusion that men were gay based on stereotypical gay interests.

Those who were told gaydar is real stereotyped much more than the control group, and participants stereotyped much less when they had been told that gaydar is just another term for stereotyping.

Researchers found that these patterns provided strong support for the idea that belief in gaydar encourages stereotyping by simply disguising it under a different label.

Assistant scientist William Cox concluded: “Even when people seem gay – and set off all the alarms on your gaydar – it’s far more likely that they’re straight. More straight people will seem to be gay than there are actual gay people in total.”

Source: Instinct