literature conceptualizes homosexuality using one of two approaches, or a combination of the
two, namely, essentialism and social constructionism (Laumann et al. 1994: 284). Founded in
biology, the essentialist view assumes that with regard to homosexuality (or asexuality), there is
an essential characteristic common to all homosexual (or all asexual) persons that is distinct and
separate from heterosexual (or sexual) persons. This common feature or essence is thought to be
biological or psychological that establishes a person’s inclusion into one of the two categories of
homosexual or heterosexual (or asexual or sexual) (Laumann et al. 1994: 285). The essentialist
view assumes the existence of a binary categorization of humans into homosexuals or
heterosexuals (or asexuals or sexuals).
The social construction view of homosexuality counters and critiques the essentialist
approach. It argues against the notion of binary categories (Foucault 1978, Butler 1990, Seidman
1996) and recommends a continuum with varying degrees of homosexuality/heterosexuality (or
asexuality/sexuality). Social constructionists often note that the concepts, definitions, and
practices of homosexuality vary across context and cultures (Laumann et al. 1994: 285). What in
one culture may be defined as “homosexual” may not be so defined in another culture. For
example, an individual may engage in same-sex sexual behavior but not identify himself/herself
as homosexual. Likewise, one might identify as homosexual but never have experienced same-
sex sex. Also, the sexuality definitions and labels attached to individuals by other persons and by
the larger society may be incongruent with how individuals per se self-identify. These same
arguments, we believe, are just as applicable to studies of asexuality.
Like homosexuality, asexuality may also be defined in terms of sexual behavior, sexual
desire (including fantasy), and self identification. In analyses of homosexuality based on data
from national surveys, social scientists have used one or more of the above concepts, particularly
those based on self-identification and behavior.
Analyses of homosexuality using data from the General Social Survey (GSS) use a
behavioral definition of homosexuality, such as whether a person’s sexual partners in the past 12
months, or in the past several years, or in one’s lifetime, have or have not been mainly or
predominantly of the same sex as the respondent (Badgett, 1995; Berg and Lien, 2002; Black,
Makar, Sanders and Taylor, 2003). The GSS does not include a question on the self-identification
of the respondent’s sexual orientation.
Analyses based on data from the National Health and Social Life Survey (NHSLS)
conducted by Laumann and his associates in 1992 (see their The Social Organization of
Sexuality: Sexual Practices in the United States [1994]) use a series of different definitions of
homosexuality, and they tend to be more closely attuned to a social constructionist view than to
an essentialist one.
3
Convention