For the estimations of same-sex sexual behavior in the past 12 months, men reported the highest number of such an experience in 1998—4.67%; women reported the highest number of such an experience in 2002—4.03%. On the other hand, men reported the lowest frequency of engaging in same-sex sexual practice in the past year at the time of interview in 1989, at 1.6%; women reported the lowest frequency of engaging in a same-sex sexual relation in the past year at the time of interview in 1988, the first year when this survey question was asked, at 0.18%. Together, these numbers strongly suggest that, over time, both men and women reported a higher prevalence of same-sex sexual experience in the last year at the time of interview, with the most obvious exception of women in 2004, when the number suddenly dropped down to 1.29% from the 4.03% reported two years earlier.
A similar trend for women can be found for the estimations of homosexual incidence in the past 5 years at the time of interview. While only 1.51% of the women sample in 1991 reported a homosexual encounter in the past 5 years, the percentage rose to 4.83 by 2002. However, in 2004, there was a drop in the percentage to 1.88. As for men, the highest number who reported participation in same-sex sexual activity in the past 5 years at the time of interview was in 2000, 5.39%; the lowest number was reported in 1993, at 2.90%. Although the high and low for men together might imply a similar steady increasing trend in reporting same-sex sexual experience in the past 5 years over time like for women, Figure 1 clearly shows that the trend in reporting incidences of male homosexual behavior in the past 5 years was, in fact, much more stable over time than the trend for women.
Finally, for the estimations of past homosexual experience since the age of 18 among United States adults, both men and women reported the highest number of incidence in 2004—10.47% of the men and 7.21% of the women. Interestingly, both numbers were also the highest among the estimations of same-sex sexual activity across all three measures for all 11 rounds of GSS administered since 1988. As for the lowest estimations of past same-sex sexual encounters since the age of 18, fewest men (3.51%) reported such an incidence in 1993, and fewest women (2.80%) reported such an incidence in 1991.
Electronic Journal of Human Sexuality