Is sexual orientation similar to eye color, consisting of fairly discrete categories? Or is it more like height—that is, falling along a continuum? As a psychologist, I have explored that question in several venues, including the February/March 2006 issue of Scientific American Mind [“Do Gays Have a Choice?”]. Although common thinking holds that everyone is either “gay” or “straight,” my new survey of nearly 18,000 people who voluntarily answered an online quiz shows that these terms are highly misleading. Sexual orientation actually lies on a smooth continuum, and the way people state their orientation is often a poor predictor of their true sexual behaviors and fantasies. Someone can call himself “gay” but behave “straight,” and vice versa.
At the Society for the Scientific Study of Sexuality meeting in November, I will report that the same continuum of scores exists in the U.S. and in the average of scores from a dozen countries outside the U.S. I also find that fewer than 10 percent of subjects score as “pure” heterosexual or homosexual and that females place, on average, farther toward the gay end of the continuum than males do. My study suggests that characterizing sexual orientation properly requires two numbers: mean sexual orientation (where a given person lies on the continuum) and sexual orientation range (how much flexibility or “choice” the person has in expressing that orientation, which also forms a continuum).
This article was originally published with the title Smooth Thinking about Sexuality.
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6 Comments
Add CommentYou'd think that this would be old news. Kinsey's scale has been around for a long time now. -- Still I really appreciate this study, and the depth and seriousness with which they are attempting to categorize human sexuality. I really think that our habit of polarizing sexuality is one of the leading causes of homophobia and sexual discrimination.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYes, Kinsey said this years ago. He was wrong then, as this study is wrong now. People lie when they answer these studies. THeyu lie because they don;t like to admit they are one thing or another, they lie because they want to seem more interesting thatn they are, have choices, they lie because they can, the studies are ononymous and without comeback. It is like penis size, people always have on average about one inch more when they self measure than when they are measured. They lie. If sex is about anything, it is about fantasy.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe article sounds pretty accurate, being homosexual myself i can relate to like coming across as straight but actually being gay.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFantasy sex does play a big part in masterbation in men.
phew! I'm relieved to read this article. I'm struggling with my sexuality right now and it is nice to think that we are all on a continuum, and as for height and weight, its possible to be "somewhere in the middle" without having to be labeled and put into a box. It makes sense to me: after all there is NOTHING in the world of nature that fits nicely into categories.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI liked your comment, missanonymous.
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I liked your comment, missanonymous.
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