Documenting prejudice against lesbians and gay men on campus: the Yale Sexual Orientation Survey.

Abstract

College and university communities recently have begun to confront the problems of harassment, discrimination, and violence against lesbians, gay men, and bisexual people on campus. A first step in responding to attacks against gay and bisexual people is to document their frequency and the forms that they take. The present article reports the methodology and results of a survey conducted at Yale University in 1986, which subsequently has been replicated on several other campuses. The Yale survey revealed that many lesbians, gay men, and bisexual people on campus lived in a world of secretiveness and fear. Although experiences of physical assault on campus were relatively infrequent, many respondents reported other forms of discrimination and harassment. A majority reported that they feared antigay violence and harassment on campus, and that such fears affected their behavior. Replications on other campuses have yielded similar results. Suggestions are offered for researchers who wish to conduct such a survey on their own campus.