Retrospectively measured individual differences in childhood sex-typed behavior among gay men: correspondence between self- and maternal reports.

Male sexual orientation is strongly associated with childhood sex-typed behavior, but there are also marked within-orientation differences. Gay men show increased variance compared to heterosexual men on retrospective measures of childhood sex-typed behavior. Individual differences among gay men for their degree of sex-typed behavior may have important implications. However, there has been little attention given to the reliability or validity of retrospective measures of such differences that are most common. Gay men and their mothers completed questionnaires assessing the men's sex-typicality during childhood. Results of structural modeling analyses found that mothers' and sons' reports were significantly associated, both regarding the general level of sex-typed behavior and the specific behaviors, supporting the validity of retrospectively measured individual differences for those characteristics.