Therapist homophobia, client sexual orientation, and source of client HIV infection as predictors of therapist reactions to clients with HIV

Four hundred twenty-five psychologists received vignettes depicting a male client who was either gay or heterosexual and whose source of HIV infection was sexual contact, a blood transfusion, intravenous drug use, or unspecified. Respondents' homophobia and reactions to the client in the vignette were measured. Canonical correlation analyses revealed that therapist attributions of client responsibility for problem cause were predicted by the source of HIV infection and therapist homophobia. In addition, therapists responded with less empathy, attributed less responsibility to the client for solving his problems, assessed the client's functioning to be worse, and were less willing to work with the client when the client's source of HIV infection was other than drugs, when the client was gay, and when therapists were more homophobic.