Randall & Totenhagen: Same-Gender Couples’ Coping Assessment Tool

Stress experienced by sexual minorities (i.e., those who identify as LGB) negatively impacts their individual and relational well-being. Because of these stressors, same gender couples face challenges leading to higher rates of dissolution and increased difficulties with coping.

Drs. Ashley K. Randall (Arizona State University) and Casey Totenhagen (University of Alabama) and their teams are using an MRI grant to develop a relationship education program designed to help same-gender couples cope with stress in the context of their relationship, along with necessary self-report measures to assess these constructs. Together, Randall and Totenhagen have translated the Couples Coping Enhancement Training (Bodenmann, 2008) from German to English, and revised it for use with same gender couples to create the Couples Coping Enhancement Training – Sexual Minority Stress (CCET-SMS). Revisions included content to focus explicitly on sexual minority stressors and program adaptations to remove potential heterosexist bias in the curriculum and workshop materials.

Totenhagen and Randall are also in the process of validating the Dyadic Coping Inventory – Sexual Minority Stress (DCI-SMS) scale, which is a self-report instrument designed to assess how individuals (and their partners) communicate and cope with sexual minority stress.

The work funded by this MRI grant will lay the groundwork for a future larger NIH proposal to examine the feasibility, acceptability, and program efficacy of the CCET-SMS. Ultimately Randall and Totenhagen’s work can be used to help mitigate the negative experiences of stress for sexual minority couples.