Support for negative self-schemas as mediators of the association between sexual orientation status and psychopathology is mixed, however. Although one between-group study showed that controlling for lower self-esteem (along with other general psychological processes) attenuated the relationship between sexual orientation and suicidality (Plöderl & Fartacek, 2005), another nationally representative study found that sexual orientation was still significantly associated with psychopathological outcomes after accounting for general psychological processes, including self-esteem (Wichstrom & Hegna, 2003). Within-group studies of sexual minorities have also produced mixed results regarding the extent to which negative self-esteem mediates the stress-psychopathology association. One study indicated that gay-related stress was still associated with psychological distress after accounting for self-esteem (Rosario et al., 1996), whereas two other studies have found reductions in the relationship between stigma-related stress and psychological distress (Hershberger & D’Augelli, 1995), as well as suicidality (Savin-Williams & Ream, 2003), after controlling for self-esteem/self-acceptance. One possible methodological reason for these mixed results is that existing studies have typically entered self-esteem along with other psychological processes into regression models. Because the number and type of these psychological processes differ
