IGF CultureWatch

More than six out of 10 college freshmen say they support the concept of "legal marital status" for gays and lesbians, according to a newly-released survey of freshmen conducted each fall by the Higher Education Research Institute at the University of California, Los Angeles.

The freshmen's support for "legal marital status" for same-sex couples rose in 2006 to an all time high of 61.2 percent, a 3.3 percentage point increase over fall 2005 when support stood at 57.9 percent. The increase continues a relatively steady upward trend since the question was first asked in 1997 when support stood at 50.9 percent.

The survey was based on responses from more than 271,000 freshmen at 393 colleges and universities, statistically adjusted to reflect responses of 1.3 million freshmen in 2006.

In a related question, only 25.6 percent of freshmen believed that it is "important to have laws prohibiting homosexual relationships," a decline of 1.8 percentage points from 27.4 percent in 2005. When that statement was introduced in 1976 it was intended to refer to sodomy laws. But in recent years students have no doubt interpreted it to refer to laws and constitutional amendments prohibiting same-sex marriage.

This year for the first time the Institute also separated out data for freshmen labeling themselves liberal, conservative and middle-of-the-road. The survey found that 83.6 percent of the liberal freshmen supported "legal marital status" for gays, as did 63 percent of middle-of-the-road freshmen. Among conservative freshmen support stood at 30.4 percent.

The results demonstrate clearly what has been implicit in the recent years, that among college freshmen, at least, supporting "legal marital status" for gays is the middle-of-the-road position. It is particular interesting that even among conservative freshmen, almost one out of three now support legal gay unions, a level of support you would not anticipate considering the opposition of prominent conservatives.

In the question about the importance of laws against legalized gay unions, only 11 percent of the liberal freshmen and only 22.8 percent of the middle-of-the-road freshmen agreed. Further, only 48.5 percent--fewer than half--of the "conservative" freshmen thought such laws are important.

Although a plurality of freshmen, 43.3 percent, still call themselves "middle-of-the-road," the centrist position has lost support in recent years while the ideological polarities of liberal and conservative have both gained support: 31.2 percent of the freshmen now call themselves "liberal" or "far left" and 25.6 percent call themselves "conservative" or "far right."

Legalized gay unions and abortion were the two issues on which liberal and conservative freshmen were most sharply divided: 78.3 percent of liberals favored legalized abortion while only 31.8 percent of the conservatives did. The findings raise the possibility that those are defining issues by which freshmen determine whether they are conservative or liberal rather than their holding those positions because of some antecedent determination that they are liberal or conservative. The data are insufficient to decide.

Consistent with previous years, freshman women were about 15 percentage points more supportive of gay unions than were the men: 67.9 percent of women supported legal marital status for same-sex couples but only 52.9 percent of freshman men.

This year was the first time that more than two-thirds of the women support legal marital status for gays and the first year that a clear majority of the men did so. Fall 2005 was the point at which exactly half of the men--50.1 percent--supported legal gay unions.

There was a similar gender divide regarding prohibiting legal gay unions. Fewer than one in five freshman women--19.3 percent--thought laws barring gay unions were important while almost exactly one-third--33.4 percent--of freshman men thought so.

Freshmen at private colleges and universities were more supportive of legalized gay unions than those at public institutions, a difference probably reflecting family income level. Freshmen at Catholic and non-sectarian private schools were far more supportive than freshmen at "other religious" colleges, primarily conservative Protestant, who were even less supportive than freshmen at public institutions. Freshmen at colleges with more rigorous entrance requirements were more supportive than freshmen at less selective institutions.

On other public issues, 37.1 percent of the freshmen supported legalized marijuana; 73 percent supported a national health care plan; 47.1 percent thought affirmative action in colleges should be abolished; 58 percent thought wealthy people should pay higher taxes; 34.5 percent thought the death penalty should be abolished; 46.7 percent thought illegal immigrants should be denied access to public education; and 56.8 percent thought abortion should be legal.