Nearly one in 10 adults in the United States identifies as L.G.B.T.Q., according to a large analysis from Gallup released Thursday — almost triple the share since Gallup began counting in 2012, and up by two-thirds since 2020.
The increases have been driven by young people, and by bisexual women.
Nearly one-quarter of adults in Generation Z, defined by Gallup as those 18 to 27, identify as L.G.B.T.Q., according to the analysis, which included 14,000 adults across all of Gallup’s telephone surveys last year. More than half of these L.G.B.T.Q. young adults identify as bisexual.
Among all respondents, 1.3 percent identified as transgender, up from 0.6 percent in 2020. That is higher than other large surveys have found in recent years.
Members of Gen Z were most likely to be transgender, Gallup found — 4.1 percent were, compared with 1.7 percent of millennials and less than 1 percent in each older generation. Various groups have tried to count this population, and Gallup’s survey is considered one of the most complete.
Respondents were asked if they considered themselves straight or heterosexual, lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender, and could choose more than one identity or volunteer another. About 86 percent of respondents said they were straight, according to Gallup.
President Trump’s administration has recently reversed a variety of initiatives aimed at supporting L.G.B.T.Q. people, particularly those who are transgender.
Based on an executive order declaring that there are only two sexes and that they cannot be changed, the Trump administration has threatened to end federal funding for hospitals that provide gender-transition health care to people under 19; ban transgender girls and women from competing on female sports teams; and ban transgender people from serving in the military.
The president has announced plans to revoke federal funding from schools that teach about “gender ideology,” and dismantled a policy protecting transgender students from discrimination. Government agencies have removed resources related to terms like L.G.B.T.Q. and gender from their websites. (Some have been restored under a court order.)
Increasing L.G.B.T.Q. identification has been “largely driven by the many decades of gradual increasing societal acceptance,” said Dr. Mitchell R. Lunn, who co-directs the Pride Study, a research project at Stanford on the health of L.G.B.T.Q. people. Now, he said, “I think we may lose a lot of the really positive momentum that we’ve built over the past decades.”
Dr. Lunn said he thinks the Gallup numbers are probably an underestimate, mostly because people might not feel comfortable sharing the information in a telephone survey. (Five percent of respondents declined to answer Gallup’s question.) He said he wouldn’t be surprised if the numbers declined next year, if social acceptance decreases under the Trump administration: “I worry that it will push some people to go back into the closet and not be out about their identity anymore.”
In the surveys, there were large differences in L.G.B.T.Q. identification by political ideology. Twenty-one percent of liberals identified this way, compared with 3 percent of conservatives. There were also significant gender differences: Women were almost twice as likely as men to identify as L.G.B.T.Q. In Gen Z, 31 percent did, compared with 12 percent of men.
Though L.G.B.T.Q. identification has increased in recent years for all but the oldest generations, it has grown fastest among young people. An average of 23 percent of Gen Z adults have identified this way over the last two years, up from 19 percent from 2020 to 2022.
Most of them identify as bisexual. Of Gen Z women, 23 percent are bisexual, compared with 12 percent of millennial women. While men have generally been less likely to identify as bisexual, that is changing for those in their teens and 20s. Eight percent of Gen Z men identify as bisexual, compared with 2 percent of millennial men, and Gen Z is the only age group in which men are likelier to say they’re bisexual than gay.
Bisexual men have faced additional stigma, studies have found, but researchers have said that might be changing for young men as the definition of masculinity has broadened, and as young people increasingly think about sexuality on a spectrum. Jessie Ford, a sociologist at Columbia, said that in her interviews with young people, they talk about wanting to be open in their sexuality and avoid rigid identities like straight or gay.
Young people have come of age during a period of unusually rapid social change in this area since the 2010s. It’s been driven by the nationwide legalization of same-sex marriage in 2015, and by pop culture and social media.
It’s now common for middle and high schools to have L.G.B.T.Q. affinity groups, which researchers have said are important for adolescent mental health at a time when they are exploring their identity. Schools have been especially welcoming in the West and Northeast, according to GLSEN, a nonprofit that researches L.G.B.T.Q. students.
Yet even as acceptance has been growing, so has stigma. Many states, particularly ones led by Republicans, have proposed or enacted restrictions aimed at L.G.B.T.Q. young people in recent years, particularly young transgender people. This has probably contributed to the poor mental health of young people who are gay or transgender, researchers said.
The post Nearly One in 10 U.S. Adults Identifies as L.G.B.T.Q., Survey Finds appeared first on New York Times.
