Open AccessUsing Ancillary Sociodemographic Data to Identify Sexual Minority Adults Among Those Responding “Something Else” or “Don’t Know” to Sexual Orientation Questions
Author(s) -
Marc N. Elliott,
James M. Dahlhamer,
Sarah MacCarthy,
Megan K. Beckett,
Nathan Orr,
Paul Guerino,
Denis Agniel,
Catherine L. Saunders,
Mark A. Schuster,
Judy Ng,
Steven C. Martino
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
medical care
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.632
H-Index - 178
eISSN - 1537-1948
pISSN - 0025-7079
DOI - 10.1097/mlr.0000000000001190
Subject(s) - sexual orientation , respondent , sexual minority , lesbian , psychology , population , health equity , orientation (vector space) , social psychology , reproductive health , demography , health care , sociology , political science , mathematics , geometry , psychoanalysis , law
General population surveys are increasingly offering broader response options for questions on sexual orientation-for example, not only gay or lesbian, but also "something else" (SE) and "don't know" (DK). However, these additional response options are potentially confusing for those who may not know what the terms mean. Researchers studying sexual orientation-based disparities face difficult methodological trade-offs regarding how best to classify respondents identifying with the SE and DK categories.