In a study from 2011, the Williams Institute estimated there are roughly 8 million Americans who _self-identify_ as lesbian, gay, or bisexual and 700,000 as transgender.<sup>23</sup> Almost twice as many, an estimate of 8.2% (19 million) of the US population, report that they have engaged in same-sex _behavior_ and 25.6 million or 11% have acknowledged some sort of same-sex _attraction_ .<sup>24</sup> This shows the sharp contrasts between LGBT _identity_ (4.3%), _sexual behavior_ (8.2%) and _sexual attraction_ (11%) components within the above definition.

A Google U.S. consumer survey found that 5.7% of respondents from a nationwide sample of 10,000 identified as LGBTI.<sup>25</sup> It is particularly interesting that more than 10% of people aged 18-24 identified as LGBT compared to only 2-3% of people older than 45.

The 2010 U.S. Census asked questions on a person’s household, which allowed the identification of some same-sex households. After accounting for reporting issues, around 650,000 same-sex households were counted or around 0.6% of all US households.<sup>26</sup> More recent data (2017) on same-sex marriages shows that there are nearly 1.1 million married LGBTI people in the US or over 547,000 same-sex couples.<sup>27</sup> This provides an alternate way to identify LGBTI people, yet it has significant limitations, including not accounting for single people and couples not sharing the same household.

# **Data from other countries**

According to data from a <u>2016 online survey in 9 EU countries, 5.9% of Europeans self-</u> identify as LGBT.<sup>28</sup> Germany has the highest percentage (7.4%), followed by Spain with 6.9% and the UK with 6.5%, while in Hungary only 1.5% self-identify as LGBTI.<sup>29</sup> An older <u>survey from the UK</u> (2010) suggests that roughly only 1.6% of the British population identifies as LGB with an additional 3% not able or willing to answer the question. A Norwegian survey from 2010, showed only 1.2% of the population identifies as lesbian, gay or bisexual.<sup>30</sup> A 2014 Australian survey came to the conclusion that 3% of men and 4% of women identified as non-heterosexual.<sup>31</sup> A survey from ten Brazilian cities indicates that on average 7.8% of the surveyed men identified as gay and 2.6% as bisexual, totaling to 10.4%

> 23 Gates, Gary J. 2011. How many people are lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender? 24 Ibid.

> 25 Only half of these reported being out at work.

> 26 Lofquist, Daphne; Lugaila, Terry; O’Connell, Martin; Feliz, Sarah; 2010. Households and Families: 2010.

> 27 Romero, Adam P. 2017. <u>1.1 Million LGBT Adults Are Married to Someone of the Same Sex at the Two-Year Anniversary of Obergefell v. Hodges.</u>

> 28 Based on a census-representative survey of 11,754 people conducted in August 2016 by Dalia Research.

> 29 Dalia Research. 2016. Counting the LGBT population: 6% of Europeans identify as LGBT.

> 30 Gulløy ,Elisabeth; Normann, Tor Morten. 2010. Sexual identity and living conditions.

> 31 Richters, Juliet; Altman, Dennis; Badcock, Paul B.; Smith, Anthony M. A.; de Visser, Richard O.; Grulich, Andrew E.; Rissel, Chris; Simpson, Judy. 2014. <u>Sexual identity, sexual attraction and sexual experience: the Second Australian Study of Health and Relationships.</u>

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