Potentially messy data, as has been pointed out - still, I would say, it’s enough to warrant a further study of the life situation for young bisexual people.
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PLEASE change the headline to LGBT teens instead of gay/questioning! HELLO bi/trans/lesbian erasure! WTH?
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I agree with you, although the survey itself doesn’t mention trans. I would have liked to see those figures, it would give an idea how many transpeople adopt hyper-masculine/femine behaviour to hide their real gender identity.
This is gross and makes no sense.
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So you are saying you have never encountered anyone who, under coercion from conservative parents/church/children, hid their trans identity with an extreme version of what other people expect them to be?
I know of a transwoman who transitioned after they were in the SAS, who admits that they only got that far because they felt they had to hide that they were trans. In their mind they couldn’t just appear to be male, they had to be the manliest man around otherwise someone might find out the truth.
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Except this has nothing to do with “hyper-masculine/feminine behavior”. Which isn’t to say that that doesn’t happen or whatever (I don’t want to argue it), but this report has nothing to do with anything “hyper-masculine” or “hyper-feminine”.
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It comes across as a bit callous and cold when you try to explain the numbers like that. As if it wasn’t people, but some sort of curious but interesting mechanical device.
At least that’s one way that your initial post felt disquieting to me. I cannot know what exactly you intended, but I imagine you didn’t want to come across like that. I think it’s partially the analysis and partially how you wrote it.
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Yeah, I’m not explaining things well today because of external stress.
Sorry.
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Interesting theory, but there are other equally plausible causes as well. For instance, studies suggest that gay teens are sexually active at an earlier age, which may mean that they have sexual encounters (both male and female) before any opportunity for sex-ed to make a difference, or before they can fully understand the consequences. Also, other studies suggest that gay teens are likely to have more sex, so there is a greater likelihood of teen pregnancy. The reverse could also be true; teens who are sexually active an earlier age, or those who are more sexually active, might be more likely to have same-sex partners.
@haddayr; sure some of the people in this survey might be L, G, B or T but not everyone who has a same sex partner is. Early in sexual development there is a stage of experimentation, and that does not define a sexual identity. I think it’s perfectly fine to say “questioning.”
I never hear people say it, but I’d say that asexuality is more likely the default. Because unless one explicitly chooses (a) partner(s), nothing happens.
Different communities may be conserving different traditions, not necessarily the same ones.
You might have read into it a bit more than was intended. I took hyper-gendered to mean something more along the lines of overcompensating. This makes sense in the given context, a person faking something they’re not.
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Sure but… how would that matter to people getting pregnant? There are lesbian and gay trans people and they have sex sometimes! In ways that can get people pregnant. They are not in any way less the gender they are by doing so, or “overcompensating”, or anything of the sort. It’s a really bizarre tangent that has nothing to do with anything.
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Even beyond the method of explanation, do you have any evidence that this occurs with any commonality versus the handwaving away of sexual preference?
Easily available: no
Anecdotal: My experiences growing up in 80s and 90s Carlisle, UK. Popular teenage male activities there: drinking, fighting, having sex with women (the more the better). I spent my time lying to everyone and hoping I would be able to get out of there as soon as possible, and I knew other pre-transition transpeople from there who didn’t have to lie. I also have no reason to believe that working class Northern England is unique in the world.
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You mistake my reading of that comment for endorsement of it. I’m not offering a competing explanation.
My intent was merely to point out that its not a comment made in bad faith, so no need to go on the offensive.
I’m pretty sure you don’t define ones sexuality through other people.
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Actual sexual activity seems more reliable than something as metaphysically shaky as belief in personal identity. One’s sexuality is what it does, rather than how one may choose to conceptualize it. There isn’t anything wrong with the latter, but my experience is that people tend to be terribly inconsistent about it.
More along the lines of what it wants to do. The “does” part is limited by availability or other constraints.
Bad science is sadly common in all fields and bad science reporting is even more common. We can’t judge the methodology without access to the original paper, which the newspaper doesn’t reference properly. 
It isn’t necessarily bad just because it’s social science.
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A social desirability bias and the most likely answer. Good survey instruments are designed to reduce that effect (and other forms of bias). Without any reference to the original paper, we’re in the dark.
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This is what kills me! Everybody worried about what everybody presumably thinks of everybody else is such a poor way to organize a society in the first place. Even when they can be encouraged to act upon goals instead - the goals are almost always still based upon these same kinds of personal problems. It’s amazing that anything worthwhile ever gets done.
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