Clarifying the Association Between Proximal Minority Stress and Relationship Satisfaction Among Partnered Latter-Day Saint Sexual Minoritized Adults: The Roles of Authenticity and Community Connectedness

Latter-day Saint (LDS) sexual minoritized (e.g., lesbian, gay, bisexual, queer) persons may face unique challenges to forming and maintaining satisfying romantic connections. Grounded in minority stress theory and relational-cultural theory, the current study examined authenticity as a statistical mediator underlying the association between indicators of proximal minority stress (i.e., identity concealment and internalized homonegativity) and relationship satisfaction among a sample of 237 LDS sexual minoritized adults who were in a committed relationship (i.e., partnered) at the time of the study. In addition, level of connectedness to lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ+) and LDS communities was examined as a moderator of these associations. Cross-sectional mediation and moderated mediation analyses were completed using the SPSS PROCESS macro (models 4 and 7). As expected, identity concealment and internalized homonegativity were both indirectly associated with lower relationship satisfaction via lower authenticity. The indirect path from internalized homonegativity to relationship satisfaction via authenticity was moderated by LGBTQ+ community connectedness; statistical mediation was significant only for participants with higher levels of LGBTQ+ community connectedness. Taken together, these findings underscore the need to consider authenticity and community connectedness when assessing relationship functioning among individuals with multiple, potentially conflicting identity-based group memberships. Such knowledge can help researchers and clinicians develop culturally-responsive individual- and couple-level interventions that best support sexual minoritized Latter-day Saint persons in coping with proximal minority stress and related relationship difficulties.