Growing Support for Gay and Lesbian Equality Since 1990

Abstract

Since 1991, public acceptance of gays and lesbians has grown dramatically. We use two approaches to examine changing attitudes in U.S. survey data. First, we conduct cohort analyses showing that both generational replacement and period effects are having impacts. Since 1991, older, less accepting generations of Americans have been dying and being replaced by younger, more tolerant Americans, and all age groups have been becoming more tolerant. Second, we pool cross-sectional, time series survey data to show that there has been a broad, dramatic increase in virtually every group's acceptance of gays and lesbians over time.

Keywords:

• gay-lesbian tolerance
• homosexual tolerance
• prejudice

Notes

1. As of January 2012, seven states and the District of Columbia either allowed same-sex marriage or had passed laws to allow same-sex marriage within the coming months (Connecticut, Iowa, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Vermont, and Washington). California's Supreme Court allowed same-sex marriage, but the decision was overturned by a ballot initiative in 2008. A federal case challenging the initiative's constitutionality is working its way through the federal courts. A total of 29 states had constitutional amendments prohibiting same-sex marriage (Human Rights Campaign, 2012; “Lawmakers Approve Same-Sex Marriage,” 2009).

2. The question in this example is identified as HOMOSEX.

3. Feeling thermometers are 100 point scales that measure a respondent's attitudes toward a person, group, or policy. Scores closer to zero indicate opposition or a lack of support, scores closer to 100 indicate increased support or favor, and scores surrounding the 50 point level indicate neutrality.

4. For a discussion of the day-to-day events that changed people's opinions about LGBT issues, see Brewer (2003).

5. We estimated a regression model with uncollapsed data and obtained similar results.