Building bridges

Abstract Friendships between lesbians and heterosexual women were explored using a sample of 47 mostly White women (23 lesbians and 24 heterosexual women), ages 18 to 25, that reported at least one close lesbian-heterosexual woman friendship. A majority of participants indicated that friendships between lesbians and heterosexual women had both uniquely positive and negative aspects that could be attributed to the difference in sexual identity. Positive aspects included socio-emo-tional benefits, opportunities for learning, and societal benefits. Negative aspects included anxiety about sexuality, doubts regarding mutual understanding, clashes of perspectives and experience, and societal stressors. Implications of the findings for challenging current social inequities associated with sexual identities were explored.