Identity formation in homosexuals: challenges, acceptance, and legalisation of homosexuality

Abstract

The construction of identity plays a vital role in an individual’s life. As a psychosocial construct; identity provides a sense of self and personality and works as a resolution of a viable pathway towards the next stage i.e. adulthood. A sense of identity arrives as a totality of one’s past and current experience. The process of identity formation is not a task that can be performed in a blink of an eye. It is a period that is marked with several crises, but what identity itself becomes a crisis for an adolescent; what if it doesn’t provide a sense of formation but deformation and abnormality; and put a question that he/she is not going through the same change and formation as others but something new, different and not acceptable. The present study aimed to investigate the formation of identity in homosexuals along with the attitudes and challenges they confront. Identity represents the psychological relationship of an individual to the social system. It is a major developmental task for an adolescent that enables him to justify his/her emotions, thoughts, patterns of behavior, and attitudes regarding his/her orientations, choices, and lifestyle(s). Identity is a powerful term that provides a sense of individuation and uniqueness to a person. Who I am? What I am doing here? What is the meaning and purpose of my living? How I am different from others along with the same emotions? All these questions create an urge in an individual to know about his existence. The notion of identity provides a basis for the ‘how’, ‘what’, and ‘why’ of a person.