Development and Psychometric Evaluation of the Sexual Minority Women’s Sexual Objectification Experiences Scale

Research has linked experiences of sexual objectification to body image and eating problems among women. Existing measures of sexual objectification were grounded in heterosexual women’s experiences. The present research extends this prior work by centering sexual minority women’s experiences to develop and evaluate the Sexual Minority Women’s Sexual Objectification Experiences Scale (SMW-SOE). In Study 1, an initial 51 items were developed, drawing on prior qualitative research with sexual minority women and existing measures of sexual objectification experiences. Exploratory factor analysis of 217 sexual minority women’s responses to the initial item set suggested an underlying structure of three interrelated factors. In Study 2, data were collected from an independent sample of 201 sexual minority women to conduct confirmatory factor analysis and evaluate validity evidence. Findings from the confirmatory factor analysis supported a higher order solution with three first-order factors. The final scale comprised 17 items: six items assessing Sexualization of Sexual Identity, five items assessing Intrusive and Explicit Sexual Advances, and six items assessing Body Evaluation. In terms of validity, SMW-SOE overall scale scores yielded expected small-to-large positive correlations with heterosexist experiences, internalization of sociocultural appearance standards, and disordered eating; SMW-SOE subscale scores yielded distinctive patterns of correlations. SMW-SOE scale and subscale items yielded acceptable Cronbach’s alphas in both samples.