MCV - "Study gives thumbs up to lesbian moms"

Lesbian parents raise happy, healthy children, according to 22-year American study.

The longest-running study into lesbian parents in the US has found discrimination, not the sexual orientation of parents, harms children, the UK’s Pink News reports.

The USA National Longitudinal Lesbian Family Study (NLLFS), based in San Francisco, has been following planned lesbian families with children conceived by donor insemination since 1986.

Data recently released is based on interviews conducted when the children were 10 years old.

The NLLFS confirms the findings of over 40 other studies on the children of lesbian and gay parents, and supports the positions of all major professional associations on the well-being of children growing up in lesbian and gay families.

The NLLFS finds that although the parents’ sexual orientation doesn’t harm children, discrimination does; the researchers report that the adverse effects of discrimination were significantly reduced when the parents, schools and communities encouraged an appreciation of diversity.

"The findings of our research conclude that children raised in lesbian parent households are healthy, happy, and high-functioning," said researcher Dr Nanette Gartrell, associate clinical professor of psychiatry at the Center of Excellence in Women's Health for the University of California, San Francisco.

"The parents created healthy, loving and safe environments where their children were able to grow and thrive.

“Even the negative effects of homophobia were largely mitigated when their parents were active participants in the lesbian community and when the children attended schools that taught an appreciation of diversity."

[Link: Original Article]