Development of a Scale of Prejudice toward Bisexual and Transgender Individuals on the Basis of Ambiguity Intolerance

Abstract

Abstract Prejudice toward bisexual and transgender individuals is motivated in part by unique (yet similar) negative stereotypes and cognitive rigidity (Huffaker & Kwon, 2016). The current research aimed to create a scale to measure bisexual and transgender prejudice on the basis of two aspects of cognitive rigidity—ambiguity intolerance and essentialist beliefs. In Study 1, scale items were generated from open-ended responses. Study two quantitively tested these items with exploratory factor analyses. In Study 3, we cross-validated our new scale with existing scales of bisexual and transgender prejudice. In Study 4, we cross-validated our scale with a measure of intolerance of ambiguity and a measure of essentialist beliefs. Future research will benefit by developing prejudice reduction strategies that specifically target those who have higher ambiguity intolerance and essentialist beliefs about bisexual and transgender individuals.