by Rene Rabeder, Statement
Among America’s youngest teenagers, the earlier rise in non-heterosexual identification is now reversing. The shift is particularly striking among girls: in 2021, more than one in four ninth-grade girls identified as bisexual; four years later, only one in eight did.
The age group that had driven much of the earlier increase is now moving in the opposite direction. The figures bolster the argument that the rapid increase in the number of so-called trans children and young people identifying as non-binary, gay, lesbian or otherwise outside the heterosexual spectrum owed more to intense hype than to genuine identification.
The figures come from the nationwide student survey conducted by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), with psychologist Jean Twenge analyzing the latest data. Overall, the share of ninth-graders identifying as lesbian, gay or bisexual fell from 17% to 11% between 2023 and 2025. Among older 12th-graders, by contrast, it fell only from 18% to 16%. The sharpest decline is therefore among the younger cohorts.
The earlier rise was not confined to the United States but was mirrored for years across Western societies. In a 2024 Ipsos survey, an average of 17% of Generation Z respondents, born between 1996 and 2012, identified as members of the LGBT+ community across 26 countries. Among Millennials (1980–1995), the figure was 11%, compared with 6% among Generation X (1966–1979) and 5% among Baby Boomers (1945–1965). This umbrella category covered sexual orientation as well as transgender identities and non-binary self-descriptions.
An increasingly queer younger generation thus seemed to be emerging as the new social norm. Yet at least when it comes to sexual orientation, America’s youngest students are no longer simply following that trajectory. Why their self-identification is changing remains unclear. But anyone who interpreted the earlier rise as an irreversible trend, or even as the new normal, will now have to reckon with the decline.