GGS-II Wave 2 Questionnaire: User module "Sexual orientation"

The GGS-II Wave 2 questionnaire was restructured to include new thematic sections, with space allocated for user-driven innovations. In 2023, an open call invited researchers to submit new content modules. This paper presents the user module “sexual orientation”.

Within the scientific research community there is rapidly expanding awareness of sexual orientation as an important demographic characteristic shaping people’s experiences, relationships, and opportunities throughout their lives. The inclusion of the selected survey module strengthens the GGS in three ways. First, it improves measurement precision regarding respondents’ sexual orientation, which is relevant for research on partnership formation, relationship dynamics, fertility intentions, available pathways into family formation, and health status and well-being disparities. Second, it allows for research on outcomes in the family domain from a diversified life course perspective, creating the possibility to map different life-course trajectories for heterosexuals and sexual minority individuals. Third, it makes the GGS an attractive data source for a new community of researchers studying the sexual minority population, with additional potential for new insights through a cross-country comparative perspective. The GGS will become one of the first cross-national, longitudinal data sources for research on the LGBT+ community. The proposed questions on sexual orientation allow for better identification of members of the LGBT+ community among respondents to the GGS. These individuals are already in the data but are currently under- or misidentified due to lack of measures that accurately capture sexual orientation.