Service Provision to LGBT Victims of Crime

Background and Purpose:   Investigators have examined the barriers that LGBT crime victims have encountered or perceived when accessing victim assistance services. However, little is known about how victim assistance service providers, which include social workers, understand the needs of LGBT victims, or how they perceive their abilities to adequately serve this population.  This study adds knowledge to this area by exploring the perspectives and experiences of victim assistance service providers regarding their knowledge, attitudes, and skills in working with LGBT victims of crime. 

Methods:  To address this gap, a qualitative study was conducted.  Data were collected from victim assistance administrators (n = 15), staff (n = 58) and volunteers (n = 10) across seven different sites across the US. Participants were selected using non-randomized, purposive sampling methods. Data were collected through focus groups, interviews, and an open-ended survey questionnaire. Participants’ experiences working with LGBT crime victims, knowledge of LGBT victimization, and perceptions of their practice with LGBT victims were explored.  Thematic analysis was conducted, with responses being transcribed and coded thematically, using Dedoose qualitative software.  Analysis was guided by the Cross Model of Cultural Competence and microaggression concepts from Critical Race Theory.

Findings:  The overall theme found in the responses was cultural blindness, which consisted of individual and institutional microaggressions that were manifested in the form of microinvalidations towards LGBT crime victims.  For example, many respondents failed to ask the victims’ sexual orientation or gender identity, made assumptions about sexual orientation based on gender expression, or were unaware of correct terminology or pronouns to use with LGBT victims.  Few respondents understood the impact of internalized homophobia, biphobia, or transphobia on their clients nor understood how LGBT clients perceived the victim assistance system.  Many respondents reported that a victim’s sexual orientation or gender identity is not at all relevant to the services that are provided.

Institutional microinvalidations also influenced how services were delivered to LGBT victims.  For example, none of the agencies provided space on their intake or documentation forms  identifying clients’ sexual orientation or transgender identity.  Little outreach had been done to the local LGBT communities, and few agencies provided training specific to working with LGBT victims.  Additionally, most of the agencies did not have LGBT specific resources, and this further suggests a form of cultural blindness. 

Conclusion and Implications:

Findings add to the extant knowledge regarding the processes that interfere with victim assistance service providers in providing culturally competent practice to LGBT victims. Further, cultural blindness may play a role in how service providers consider the sexual orientation or gender identity if a victim to be significant, and what contributes to their decision to ask or not ask for a victim’s sexual orientation or gender identity.  These findings suggest the need for social workers who are affiliated with the victim assistance system to specifically train service providers on LGBT identity development, establish rapport with the LGBT community, and best advocate for the needs of LGBT victims.