Researcher and Educator Still Waiting for AP to Retract Story on Lesbian Study
by Mary Rettig
May 18, 2006
(AgapePress) - - An associate professor of psychology at Grove City College says Associated Press has been reluctant to correct an article about research into how lesbians perceive smells. The AP report suggested that homosexuality has a biological origin.
Dr. Warren Throckmorton says the original Swedish research was published in the May 9 edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The research, conducted by Dr. Ivanka Savic, said lesbians' brains perceived hormone-derived scents in a similar manner as heterosexual men. Throckmorton says the story distributed by Associated Press claimed the research added weight to the idea that homosexuality is not a learned behavior -- a concept the study said nothing about.
"The study was not a study of learning. It wasn't a study to see if these brain activation patterns were learned," says Throckmorton. "It was simply a study of what was in real time."
So what did AP report? "They reported that the subjective experiences of the participants were different based upon sexual orientation," says the Pennsylvania educator.
"They said that the lesbians had different feeling responses to the scents than did straight women and then also more like straight men," he explains. "But that's not the case. There were very minor differences. They were due to chance or very likely due to chance because they weren't statistically significant."
Throckmorton and Savic both contacted AP, pointing out that the research said nothing about the cause of the response. The news service issued a clarification saying there was no statistical difference in the research subjects' reactions. However, Throckmorton says Associated Press has yet to rescind the statement about this research supporting the idea that homosexuality has a biological origin.
Mary Rettig, a regular contributor to AgapePress, is a reporter for American Family Radio News, which can be heard online.
