African-Americans and other racial and ethnic minorities are more likely than white Americans to identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or queer, according to a new Gallup Special Report.
According to the survey that polled more the 121,000 Americans, 4.6 percent of African-Americans identified as LGBTQ along with four percent of Hispanics and 4.3 percent of Asians. Among white Americans, the figure was 3.2 percent.
The results showed that 3.4 percent of U.S. adults overall identified themselves as lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender.
The survey, which is co-authored by Williams Distinguished Scholar Gary J. Gates and Gallup Editor-in-chief Frank Newport, also showed that younger Americans (ages 18-29) are three times more likely than seniors to identify as LGBTQ
The findings are based on the largest representative sample of LGBT men and women ever collected.
“This report not only confirms the validity of prior estimates of the size of the LGBT population, but also provides new insight into the diversity within the LGBT community,” Gates said. “It will dramatically increase our understanding of the lives and views of LGBT Americans, and I congratulate Gallup for adding this important question to their tracking poll.”
This is the first of several reports that will analyze data collected as part of Gallup’s daily tracking survey where respondents are asked if they personally identify as gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender.
Contrary to many studies using smaller data samples, Americans with lower levels of education are more likely than their higher-educated counterparts to identify as LGBT. Among those with a high school education or less, 3.5 percent identified as LGBT, compared to 2.8 percent of those with a college degree and 3.2 percent of those with a graduate education. LGBT identification is highest among those with some college education, but not a college degree, at four percent.
The analyses also show that raising children under age 18 in the home is as common among LGBT women as it is among non-LGBT women. In both groups, about a third had children. That was also true of non-LGBT men. Just 16 percent of them were raising a child in their home.
“These findings offer new and compelling evidence of the diversity and complexity of the LGBT community in the U.S.,” Gates said. “They offer an unprecedented resource for informing LGBT-related debates like those regarding marriage, parenting, and workplace discrimination with much-needed facts rather than stereotype or anecdote.”
