This book provides the first compilation of demographic research focused on transgender, nonbinary, and gender minority populations. It discusses the measurement and conceptualization challenges that shape demographic knowledge of these populations, including how we capture gender on surveys. It examines our current knowledge of demographic characteristics and health disparities and outcomes. Overall, this research demonstrates the increasing knowledge of gender variation at the population level. At the same time, it reveals the need for better survey questions, additional data, and inquiry into a broader subset of demographic questions for these populations as there is little understanding of fundamental demographic information, including migration or spatial distribution of transgender populations, fertility and household structure, labor market outcomes, or broader patterns of morbidity and mortality. The research set forth in this book lays the groundwork for a trans demography that would produce population-level knowledge of these populations and points researchers and policymakers toward needed areas of research, conceptualization, and data collection.

Addressing the lack of understanding regarding the lives of same sex-couples, this book examines the sociodemographic characteristics of partnered gay men and lesbians. Ultimately, this book provides a foundation for future research, policy law, and understanding.

The decision to have a child is seldom a simple one, often fraught with complexities regarding emotional readiness, finances, marital status, and compatibility with life and career goals. Rarely, though, do individuals consider the role of the law in facilitating or inhibiting their ability to have a child or to parent. For LGBT individuals, however, parenting is saturated with legality - including the initial decision of whether to have a child, how to have a child, whether one's relationship with their child will be recognized, and everyday acts of parenting like completing forms or picking up children from school. Through in-depth interviews with 137 LGBT parents, Amanda K. Baumle and D'Lane R. Compton examine the role of the law in the lives of LGBT parents and how individuals use the law when making decisions about family formation or parenting. Baumle and Compton explore the ways in which LGBT parents participate in the process of constructing legality through accepting, modifying, or rejecting legal meanings about their families. Few groups encounter as much variation in access to everyday legal rights pertaining to the family as do LGBT parents. This complexity and variation in legal environments provides a rather unique opportunity to examine the manner in which legal context affects the ways in which individuals come to understand the meaning and utility of the law for their lives. The authors conclude that legality is constructed through a complex interplay of legal context, social networks, individual characteristics, and familial desires. Ultimately, the stories of LGBT parents in this book reflect a rich and varied relationship between the law, the state, and the private family goals of individuals.

This book provides the first compilation of demographic research focused on transgender, nonbinary, and gender minority populations. It discusses the measurement and conceptualization challenges that shape demographic knowledge of these populations, including how we capture gender on surveys. It examines our current knowledge of demographic characteristics and health disparities and outcomes. Overall, this research demonstrates the increasing knowledge of gender variation at the population level. At the same time, it reveals the need for better survey questions, additional data, and inquiry into a broader subset of demographic questions for these populations as there is little understanding of fundamental demographic information, including migration or spatial distribution of transgender populations, fertility and household structure, labor market outcomes, or broader patterns of morbidity and mortality. The research set forth in this book lays the groundwork for a trans demography that would produce population-level knowledge of these populations and points researchers and policymakers toward needed areas of research, conceptualization, and data collection.

The "International Handbook on the Demography of Sexuality" is the first book to specifically address the study of sexuality from a demographic perspective. Demographic research has largely paid little attention to sexuality as a whole, or sexual orientation in particular, other than in studies examining the "consequences" of sex - sexually transmitted infections or fertility. Instead, the content of this handbook explores population sexuality in order to describe the prevalence of sexual behaviors, desires, and identities, as well as their connections with other demographic outcomes. The focus is on analyzing sexuality as a demographic topic in its own right, rather than solely as a variable in studies of sexually transmitted infection or other health-related topics. In this book, both researchers with traditional demographic backgrounds, as well as those with training in other disciplines, provide an overview of the state of current research on population sexuality. These chapters provide a foundation for the development of research in the burgeoning field of the demography of sexuality.

The decision to have a child is seldom a simple one, often fraught with complexities regarding emotional readiness, finances, marital status, and compatibility with life and career goals. Rarely, though, do individuals consider the role of the law in facilitating or inhibiting their ability to have a child or to parent. For LGBT individuals, however, parenting is saturated with legality - including the initial decision of whether to have a child, how to have a child, whether one's relationship with their child will be recognized, and everyday acts of parenting like completing forms or picking up children from school. Through in-depth interviews with 137 LGBT parents, Amanda K. Baumle and D'Lane R. Compton examine the role of the law in the lives of LGBT parents and how individuals use the law when making decisions about family formation or parenting. Baumle and Compton explore the ways in which LGBT parents participate in the process of constructing legality through accepting, modifying, or rejecting legal meanings about their families. Few groups encounter as much variation in access to everyday legal rights pertaining to the family as do LGBT parents. This complexity and variation in legal environments provides a rather unique opportunity to examine the manner in which legal context affects the ways in which individuals come to understand the meaning and utility of the law for their lives. The authors conclude that legality is constructed through a complex interplay of legal context, social networks, individual characteristics, and familial desires. Ultimately, the stories of LGBT parents in this book reflect a rich and varied relationship between the law, the state, and the private family goals of individuals.