Sexual Identities: The State of the Field and Future Directions

This essay overviews some of the major themes that have emerged from the sociological study of sexual identities (e.g., heterosexual/straight and LGBQ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and queer)) over the past several decades. Only a minority of countries have representative data available about sexual identification, although it is now available for the first time in certain countries, including Brazil and Japan. Although the prevalence of LGBQ identification varies, it is far higher in the Unites States than anywhere else, and the gender gap is larger as well. The primary reason why the Unites States is an outlier is because young American women have such high rates of LGBQ, and especially bisexual, identification. A uniquely strong link between left-wing ideology and LGBQ identity in the Unites States may help explain this trend. Other work has examined identity-behavior discordance among heterosexuals, the demography of emerging sexual identities such as asexual, and secondary sexual identities such as “daddy” and “bear” among gay men. While there is extensive work about LGBQ life in the Unites States and to a lesser extent in other parts of the Western world, LGBQ life in other global regions is underrepresented in the literature.