The EU LGBTI II Survey, 2019

The EU LGBTI II survey was carried out by the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) in 2019. It is a large-scale survey into experiences and views of lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans and intersex (LGBTI) individuals. The survey provides comparative evidence on how LGBTI persons in the EU experience discrimination, violence and harassment in different areas of life, including employment, education, healthcare, housing and other services.

The EU LGBTI II survey is a follow-up of the first–ever major international survey on LGBT people, which the Agency conducted in 2012. The EU LGBTI II survey is a follow-up to the first major international survey of LGBT people conducted by the Agency in 2012. The EU LGBTI II survey is a web-based opt-in survey using an anonymous online questionnaire. The survey is based on a self-selective sample. The survey was conducted between 27 May and 22 July 2019 via the website www.lgbtisurvey.eu and collected valid responses from 139,799 respondents from the Member States of the European Union (EU), Northern Macedonia and Serbia (in this context, the United Kingdom is included in the group of EU Member States, reflecting the situation at the time of data collection in 2019). Following an EU-wide open call for tenders, the FRA contracted a consortium of Agilis SA (http://www.agilis-sa.gr/) and Homoevolution (https://homoevolution.com/), based in Greece, to carry out the survey according to the FRA´s technical specifications and under the supervision of FRA staff who monitored compliance with strict quality control procedures.

The EU LGBTI II survey asked a number of questions about the experiences of LGBTI people in the following areas: (1) Perceived increase or decrease in intolerance, prejudice and violence against LGBTI people; (2) Discrimination at work, looking for work and in several other areas of life; (3) Safe environment; (4) Physical or sexual victimisation; (5) Harassment; (6) Social context of being LGBTI; (7) Background information (age, education, income, civil status); (8) Specific sections dedicated to issues related to the life of trans as well as intersex persons.

1. Sexual orientation and sexual behaviour: to whom is the respondent sexually attracted; sex of sexual partners in the last five years; country of current residence and length of stay; citizen of the country; citizenship; country of birth; age at realisation of sexual orientation; age at first outing.

2. Trans respondents: Age at realisation that feelings about one´s own sex do not match the sex assigned at birth; age at first outing; measures taken to change body to better match one´s own sex identity and age at first intervention; reasons why no measures were taken to change body; medical treatment abroad to change one´s appearance, including buying hormones via the internet; avoiding expressing one´s own sex (or desired sex) by means of appearance and clothing for fear of being attacked, threatened or harassed; changing one´s legal sex; reasons for not changing one´s legal sex so far.

3. Intersexual respondents: type of existing variants of sexual characteristics or treatment for them; diagnosis of variants of sexual characteristics by health professionals; time of diagnosis (before birth, at birth, in childhood, adolescence or at a later age); time of first diagnosis in adolescence or at a later age; age at first realisation of variants of one´s own sexual characteristics; age at first outing; medical treatment to change sexual characteristics; age at first medical treatment; age at first medical treatment; consent given to treatment; type of treatment; informing the interviewee or his/her parents about possible positive or negative consequences; difficulties in registering civil status or sex in public documents; nature of difficulties; greatest difficulties encountered by intersexuals in the country.

4. Developments and responses to homophobia, transphobia, biphobia and intersex phobia: perceived increase or decrease in intolerance, prejudice and violence against LGBTI persons in the country over the last five years; main reasons for decrease or increase in prejudice and intolerance or violence; effectiveness of government action in combating prejudice and intolerance

5. Discrimination at work, when looking for work and in various other areas of life: Experience of discrimination in different spheres of life; situation at the time of the most recent discrimination; reasons for discrimination other than LGBTI; reporting of the incident by the respondent or another person; organisation or institution to which the incident was reported; reasons why the incident was not reported; paid employment during the last five years; personal contact and experiences of LGBTI during employment: openness towards others, silence, negative comments towards oneself or one´s own person general; experienced or perceived support in the professional environment; experience of LGBTI during schooling; experienced discrimination by classmates or teachers during schooling; consideration of changing schools, experienced or perceived support during schooling; LGBTI as an issue during schooling; experienced discrimination in health services; awareness of support organisations in the country; awareness of equality bodies in the country.

6. Safe environment: frequency of avoidance behaviour for fear of being attacked, threatened or harassed (holding hands with a same-sex partner in public, avoiding certain places or locations); situation where open contact with LGBTI is avoided; appropriate response by the state government to the safety needs of LGBTI persons.

7. Physical and sexual victimisation: frequency of physical or sexual assaults in the last five years for any reason and in relation to LGBTI; time of the last physical or sexual assault for LGBTI; type of last assault, single or multiple assailants; perpetrator or relationship to perpetrator; sex of perpetrator; location of assault; reporting of the incident to an organisation or institution and type of institution; reason why the incident was not reported to the police; health effects of the incident

8. Harassment: type of experienced harassment for any reason in the last five years; frequency of experienced harassment for any reason and LGBTI in the last twelve months; frequency of incidents; other reason for offensive or threatening incident; time of the last incident; nature of the offensive or threatening incident; single or multiple perpetrators; perpetrator(s) or Relationship to the offender; sex of the offender; location of the incident; report of the incident to an organisation or institution and the nature of that institution; reason why the incident was not reported to the police.

9. Social context: openness in dealing with LGBTI towards different groups (proportion), general life satisfaction.

10. Background information: highest educational attainment; employment status; degree of urbanisation of the place of residence; marital status; living with partner/spouse; sex of the partner; full or partial openness towards the partner; nationality of the partner; moving within the EU together with the same sex partner after marriage or registration of the partnership; difficulties in accessing benefits or services due to the same sex partner; household size; household composition; Children and relationship with these children; raising a child/children together with the partner; legal situation in the family regarding children; membership of a minority; religious affiliation; self-assessment of health; longstanding illness or health problem; feeling depressed in the last two weeks; getting by on the household income; experience with housing problems; duration of housing problems; ranking of the three most important reasons for housing problems.

11. Knowledge of the survey: source of information about the survey; type and frequency of media use; participation in the FRA EU LGBT survey in 2012, participation in other surveys for LGBTI people, no participation in other surveys; active support of LGBTI organisations

Demography: age (grouped); sex assigned at birth; self-description; sexual orientation (grouped); intersexual; Trans person; current gender identity.

Additionally coded: Respondent ID; respondent category; interview duration (in seconds); Benchmark X Propensity Combination Weight standardised and trimmed (0.1 - 10. 0 range); EU-30 country weight X Benchmark X Propensity Combination Weight (2019); EU-28 country weight X Benchmark X Propensity Combination Weight (2019); EU-27 country weight X Benchmark X Propensity Combination Weight (2019); Openness scale about being LGBTI, Openness about being LGBTI at work; Openness about being LGBTI at the school; General discrimination in the last 12 months in different areas of life ; Experienced discrimination in the last 12 months in employment (lkw work, atwork); reported a physical or sexual attack to an organisation; experienced harassment in the 5 years prior to the survey for any reason; experienced harassment in the 12 months prior to the survey for any reason; experienced harassment in the 12 months prior to the survey for any reason; experienced harassment in the 12 months prior to the survey because of LGBTI; informed consent to medical treatment; informed consent to medical treatment; informed consent to medical treatment. Treatment/intervention to change sexual characteristics (intersex only).