SEXUAL PREFERENCE OF MALES: IDENTIFICATION WITH MOTHER

March 2009
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It is commonly thought that prehomosexual boys identify more with their mothers than do preheterosexual boys. This presumed difference has been considered an outcome of particularly close mother-son relationships, of mothers’ occupying a position of dominance within the family, or of these two factors combined. When a boy does identify with his mother, particularly to the exclusion of his father, it is thought that he will have more trouble being comfortable with his own maleness and perhaps develop a “feminine” gender identity, which, in turn, could foster homosexual interests.

There is some empirical support for the notion that homosexual males identify more with their mothers than do heterosexual males. In one study the investigators found a stronger maternal identification among their homosexual than among their heterosexual subjects, while in another almost two-thirds of the homosexual men, compared with one-third of the heterosexuals, were found to have identified chiefly with their mothers.

A boy’s mother seems to have only a limited influence on his sexual orientation in adulthood. Feeling especially close to his mother does appear to have some effect on the extent to which a boy shares the interests of his peers, and perceiving his mother as particularly strong may lead to early sexual involvement with other boys. However, when these variables are subjected to path analysis, they prove to be useful only in understanding a boy’s childhood situation and have very little ultimate influence on his adult sexual preference.

Nor can we support the contention of some theorists that homosexuality may derive from either a seductive mother-son relationship or a negative one, either of which might elicit in the son a fear or mistrust of females. Hardly any of the homosexual respondents reported such experiences with their mothers.

We must also question the argument that portrays male homosexuality as the result of too strong an identification with the mother, with its attendant consequences for sexual object choice. Our homosexual and heterosexual respondents did not differ in this respect.

We suggest that a mother’s influences on her son’s psychosexual development are not only of small magnitude—and thus much exaggerated in psychoanalytic theory—but also dependent on other, subsequent experiences if they are to have any effect at all. This is not to say that no male ever becomes homosexual as a result of something about his mother or his relationship with her; but our data indicate that at least among our respondents such cases are not at all prevalent. Clearly, then, we must look elsewhere for any major determinant of sexual preference.

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