All in (or out of) the family? Locating sexual minority disadvantage in kinship support

Kinship networks transmit advantages across generations, but queer people, who are often denied access to kinship, may be less able to draw on kin for support. Previous studies, which focus primarily on the parent-child dyad, could overstate queer disadvantage in kinship support if extended kin compensate for parents, or understate it if their support is contingent on parents. Drawing on ego-centric network data on 25–35-year-olds in ten Western countries (N=9,592 Egos; n=124,856 kin ties), I argue that accountability to heterosexuality shapes where in the network queer-straight support gaps arise, as well as their size and direction. I focus on the receipt of financial and emotional support from parents, siblings, grandparents, piblings, and cousins. Findings indicate that support gaps are modest and concentrated at the parental tie: I identify a queer premium in financial support alongside a queer penalty in emotional support, whereas gaps are absent or reversed among other kin. Extended kin do not compensate for either queer or straight young adults. Queer disadvantage is thus neither offset nor amplified by extended kin, but lies in its source—parents, who are central to flows of support within the broader kinship network.