STEREOTYPES often surround most minorities and gay women are no exception.
But when it comes to having a few bevs it turns out LGB (lesbian, gay and bisexual) women drink far more than their straight counterparts.
Scientists in the US used to believe that "sexual-minority women’s heightened risk of hazardous drinking" might be caused by the stress of coming out or childhood trauma.
But a new UK based study undertaken by PACE, Britain's leading LGBT mental health charity, reveals that despite gay ladies having a more "hazardous" relationship with the bottle than straight women they are LESS likely to be alcoholics.
The five-year study looked at the drinking habits of 2,000 women and found that 31.9% of heterosexual women engaged in "problematic" drinking – compared to 37.1% of lesbian and bisexual women.
But despite apparently drinking more, levels of addiction are almost the same – 4% for straight women and 4.5% for LGB women – which is within margin of error.
So why do lesbians drink more?
Margaret Unwin, the CEO of PACE, told BuzzFeed: "We were initially surprised that RaRE (Risk and Resilience Explored) didn’t appear to show significant differences for LGB women and drinking (compared to their heterosexual peers) as other research has done.
"However, the study showed that problematic drinking among lesbian and bisexual women is often associated with prevailing heterosexism, such as difficulties within families, anxiety about coming out and fear of or actual negative responses when accessing services.
"These factors create pressures which can partly explain why LGB women may have problematic drinking patterns. This needs further research to unpick the issues."
It could also be the case that gay women have less places in which to meet someone of the same sex in – with most meeting places being clubs or bars.
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