Measuring sexual self-concept: a methodological review
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Sexual self-concept (SSC) is a person’s perception of themself as a sexual being. SSC is a key construct in understanding people’s sexuality. However, the extent to which sexuality researchers consistently define, measure, and evaluate SSC is unknown. In this review, we determine the common elements of researchers’ conceptual definitions of SSC (RQ1), describe how researchers measure SSC (RQ2), examine the structural (RQ3) and external (RQ4) validity of these measures, and (highlight who is represented in the creation of SSC measures (RQ5). We conducted a comprehensive review of 67 peer-reviewed SSC studies identified through a systematic search of five databases. We extracted data using Loevinger’s (1957) three phases of construct validation: substantive, structural, and external. Our results highlight current limitations in SSC construct validity. Of the 67 studies, 50 provided a conceptual SSC definition, including 14 unique definitions. Additionally, there were 32 unique measures of SSC, providing 34 distinct subscales. White (38.3%), female (47.8%), and North American (47.8%) participants were mostly represented in the research; sexual minoritized people’s perceptions were underrepresented. We discuss the importance of having consistent theory-driven definitions of SSC. Moreover, researchers must consider how different groups of people uniquely understand and construct their SSCs to improve knowledge.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Direct model labels (unvalidated)
Per-model category and study-design labels from the labeling rounds. They are machine output, unvalidated, and the disagreement between models ships as data. No study design here is MEDLINE-validated yet.
| Model arm | Categories | Study design | Confidence |
|---|---|---|---|
| gemma | Metaresearch Domain: Methods · Genre: Review About the Canadian research system: no · About a Canadian topic: no | Not applicable | low |
| gpt | no category Domain: not available · Genre: Review About the Canadian research system: no · About a Canadian topic: no | Systematic review | low |
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.059 | 0.190 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.006 | 0.007 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.022 | 0.019 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.002 | 0.002 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.005 | 0.005 |
| Open science | 0.004 | 0.004 |
| Research integrity | 0.003 | 0.002 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.003 | 0.001 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedLabeled directly by 2 models reading the full record.
The models disagree on parts of this classification; every voice is preserved in the section at the end of the page.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".