In this self-published book, the author explains that the writing of the book grew, in part, out of her desire to make sexual orientation studies and research more interesting to her students.
Her goal is to do this by encasing such studies (largely psychological and biological) and controversies within narratives about the personal lives of the researchers (e.g., the researchers’ sexual orientation, when they came out, personal motivations for research) and within narratives about the social factors and issues surrounding such research (e.g., the oft-told story of removal of homosexuality from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders by the American Psychiatric Association in 1973 or the objections by both right and left for much biologically based sexual orientation research).
Among researchers discussed in the book are Simon LeVay, Dean Hamer, Michael Bailey, and Evelyn Hooker. Pittman provides separate treatments of the possible biological origins or influences on sexual orientation, sexual identity and bisexuality, transgender issues, intersexuality, homophobia, and the marriage equality debate. Most of the summaries of findings for biologically based sexual orientation research can be found in Gay, Straight, and the Reason Why (2011) by Simon LeVay and published by Oxford University Press.
The treatments of bisexuality, transgender issues, intersexuality, homophobia, and the controversies around gay marriage are not in LeVay but, for the most part, the information in those sections can be found elsewhere as well.
The book reads in many ways like well fleshed-out lectures on the set of topics treated. If someone were teaching a course on the psychology of sexual orientation or an introduction to GLBT research to undergraduate students and wanted a good summary of findings and controversies surrounding them, this would be useful in developing a syllabus.
Alternatively, it would be useful in a public library for general readers who preferred it to LeVay’s more academic treatment and did not choose to search other sources for the full account of other topics in sexual orientation research.
Reviewer: David Woolwine
Hofstra University, Hempstead (NY)