Social Support and Attachment to Pets Moderate the Association between Sexual and Gender Minority Status and the Likelihood of Delaying or Avoiding COVID-19 Testing

Angela Matijczak, Jennifer W. Applebaum, Shanna K. Kattari and Shelby E. McDonald
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Angela Matijczak: School of Social Work, Virginia Commonwealth University, 1000 Floyd Ave, Richmond, VA 23284, USA
Jennifer W. Applebaum: Department of Sociology and Criminology & Law, University of Florida, 3219 Turlington Hall, Gainesville, FL 32611, USA
Shanna K. Kattari: School of Social Work and College of Literature, Science, and the Arts Department of Women’s and Gender Studies, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA
Shelby E. McDonald: Children, Families, and Animals Research (CFAR) Group, LLC, Richmond, VA 23223, USA

Social Sciences, 2021, vol. 10, issue 8, 1-15

Abstract: Sexual and gender minority individuals (SGM) face barriers to accessing COVID-19 testing and treatment services. Living with pets may pose an additional barrier due to concerns about pet welfare. This study investigates whether the relation between SGM status and the likelihood of delaying or avoiding testing and treatment for COVID-19 varies as a function of attachment to pets and social support. Our sample consisted of 1453 adults ( M age = 39.4 years, 12.6% racial/ethnic minority; 21.8% SGM). We conducted simple and additive multiple moderation analyses to investigate the moderating effect of attachment to pets and social support on the relation between SGM status and the likelihood of delaying or avoiding COVID-19 testing or treatment. Attachment to pets moderated the association between SGM status and the likelihood of delaying or avoiding COVID-19 testing in the simple ( ? = 0.82, Z = 2.09, p = 0.04) and additive multiple moderation analyses ( ? = 0.82, Z = 2.05, p = 0.04). SGM participants were more likely than non-SGM participants to report that they would delay or avoid testing when they reported high attachment to their pet ( ? = 0.75, OR = 2.11, Z = 2.51, p = 0.01) and low ( ? = 0.75, OR = 2.12, Z = 2.48, p = 0.01) or moderate ( ? = 0.73, OR = 2.08, Z = 2.14, p = 0.03) levels of social support.

Keywords: COVID-19; sexual and gender minority; LGBTQ; pets; companion animals; social support (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: A B N P Y80 Z00 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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