Social Support and Attachment to Pets Moderate the Association between Sexual and Gender Minority Status and the Likelihood of Delaying or Avoiding COVID-19 Testing

Abstract

Sexual and gender minority individuals (SGM) face barriers to accessing COVID-19 testing and treatment services. Living with pets may pose an additional barrier due to concerns about pet welfare. This study investigates whether the relation between SGM status and the likelihood of delaying or avoiding testing and treatment for COVID-19 varies as a function of attachment to pets and social support. Our sample consisted of 1453 adults (Mage = 39.4 years, 12.6% racial/ethnic minority; 21.8% SGM). We conducted simple and additive multiple moderation analyses to investigate the moderating effect of attachment to pets and social support on the relation between SGM status and the likelihood of delaying or avoiding COVID-19 testing or treatment. Attachment to pets moderated the association between SGM status and the likelihood of delaying or avoiding COVID-19 testing in the simple (β = 0.82, Z = 2.09, p = 0.04) and additive multiple moderation analyses (β = 0.82, Z = 2.05, p = 0.04). SGM participants were more likely than non-SGM participants to report that they would delay or avoid testing when they reported high attachment to their pet (β = 0.75, OR = 2.11, Z = 2.51, p = 0.01) and low (β = 0.75, OR = 2.12, Z = 2.48, p = 0.01) or moderate (β = 0.73, OR = 2.08, Z = 2.14, p = 0.03) levels of social support.

Keywords

• COVID-19
• sexual and gender minority
• LGBTQ
• pets
• companion animals
• social support