How common is bisexuality in men
Bisexual men aren't fully double attraction, a controversial study suggests.
In the study, attracted to both genders men reported being sexually aroused by erotic videos of both men and women. But a device attached to their genitals told another story.
Gerulf Rieger, a PhD candidate at Northwestern University, conducted the study with psychology professor J. Michael Bailey, PhD.
"We used measures of sexual arousal to explain accurate sexual feeling," Rieger tells WebMD. "In men, there is no good evidence that something like a true bisexual attraction is out there."
That conclusion doesn't fit with the encounter of San Francisco psychologist Geri Weitzman, PhD, who runs a Web site listing bisexual-friendly professional services.
"I have seen in my practice very, very, very many men who are bisexual," Weitzman tells WebMD. "Really, there are so many bisexual men out there. There are so many men who speak — and demonstrate — that they love men and love women and are happy with it."
Rieger and Bailey are looking in the wrong place for men's sexual identities, says Sheeri Kritzer, a Bisexual Resource Center board member. Identity, she says, comes from above the ears, not below the belt.
"The wh
For Pride Month, 6 truths about bisexual Americans
In June every year, Americans observe LGBTQ+ Pride Month, marking the anniversary of the Stonewall Uprising of 1969 – a series of encounters between police and LGBTQ+ protesters in Recent York City.
Pew Research Center previously has explored topics including the experiences and views of lesbian, lgbtq+, bisexual and transgender Americans and transgender and nonbinary Americans. The Center has also studied public attitudes about same-sex marriage in the United States. This analysis highlights key knowledge about the largest organization among those who spot as LGBTQ+: bisexual Americans.
How we did this
Pew Study Center published this assessment to provide an overview of findings about attracted to both genders Americans. This overview is based on data from Center surveys and analyses conducted from 2019 to 2023, including a 2019 analysis of 2017 survey data from Stanford University and a 2023 study of lesbian, gay, pansexual and transgender lawmakers in Congress. More information about the Center studies cited in the analysis, including the questions asked and their methodologies, can be found at the links in the text.
This main data source f
Researchers Revisit Male Bisexuality — and Draw Critics
Some 2 percent of men in the U.S. identify as bisexual. But, for decades, some sexuality researchers have questioned whether true attracted to both genders orientation exists in men.
In 2005, J. Michael Bailey, a sexuality researcher at Northwestern University, and two colleagues showed men who identify as pansexual brief pornographic clips featuring men or women, while measuring their subjects’ self-reported arousal and modify in penis circumference. The results, when compared to men who identified as straight or lgbtq+, led them to conclude that the men identifying as bisexual did not actually have “strong genital arousal to both male and female sexual stimuli.” This was in contrast to perform on sexual arousal in women, which showed that they — whether spotting as straight or gay — were physically aroused by both male and female stimuli.
A New York Times headline covering Bailey’s 2005 study on men declared: “Straight, Gay, or Lying? Bisexuality Revisited.”
But the paper also spurred more study into the subject — some of which has now led Bailey to revise his conclusions. In a folio published last month in the Proceedin
In a 2022 Pew Research Center Poll, 5 percent of Americans identify as bisexual. Comparing across generations and the sexes, 12 percent of Generation Z say they're pansexual, but only 1 percent of Generation X identify as bisexual. Across all generations, far more women than men identify as fluid, and this is especially true among Generation Z youths. Thus, the retort to the interrogate “Do bi men exist?” is clearly yes; less noticeable is whether the generational difference among men is reflected in the assertion of bisexuality.
Two men who are attracted to both women and men unveil the drastic changes that have occurred from Generation X to Generation Z in the acceptability of bisexuality among men. Writer Charles Blow, age 53, grew up in a time when “[Bisexuality]would seem to me woefully inadequate and impressionistically inaccurate.”Woody Cook, age 23, believes “this is sort of the age of bisexuality... It’s a thing on its own.”
Why the difference?
A silenced bisexual teenager in the 1980s, Gen X’s Charles Burst, author of Fire Shut Up in My Bones: A Memoir, grew up in rural Louisiana where being a Black bisexual bloke was certainly not a prestigious standing. According
How many men are bisexual?
There might be more than you think
Written by Abigail Swoap
A few weeks ago, I sat down with my roommates to proceed our nightly binge-watch of Schitt’s Creek. It was the episode where David (the family’s flamboyant son) describes his sexuality in an extended metaphor about wine.
David: I do beverage red wine, but I also drink white wine. And I’ve been acknowledged to sample the occasional rosé. And a couple of summers back I tried a Merlot that used to be Chardonnay. Which got a bit complicated.
Stevie: So really you’re just open to all wines.
David: I like the wine and not the label. Does that build sense?
It was one of those television moments that will stay with me for a prolonged time. Not just because it’s a hilarious way to define pansexuality, but also because while we were watching it, I realized it was one of the only representations of a man with a bi+ identity I’d ever seen in mainstream media.
TV shows and movies have a history of bisexual erasure,1which GLAAD defines as “a pervasive problem in which the existence or legitimacy of bisexuality (either in general or in regards to an individual) is questioned or denied outright.” The same prob