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Homosexuality is one of the three main categories of sexual orientation, along with bisexuality and heterosexuality, within the heterosexual-homosexual continuum (with asexuality sometimes considered the fourth). Scientific and medical understanding is that sexual orientation is not a choice, but rather a complex interplay of biological and environmental factors.[1][3] While some religious organizations hold the view that homosexual activity is unnatural or dysfunctional,[4] research shows that homosexuality is an example of normal variation in human sexuality and not a source of negative psychological effects.[1] Prejudice and discrimination against homosexual and bisexual people, however, have been shown to cause psychological harm.[5]
The most common terms for homosexual people are lesbian for women and gay for men, though gay is also used to refer generally to homosexual men and women. The number of people who identify as gay or lesbian—and the proportion of people who have same-sex sexual experiences—are difficult for researchers to estimate reliably for a variety of reasons.[6] In the modern West, according to major studies, 2% to 13% of the population is homosexual or has had some form of same-sex sexual contact within his or her lifetime.[7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17] In a 2006 study 20% of respondents anonymously reported some homosexual feelings, although fewer participants identified themselves as homosexual.[18] Homosexual behavior is also widely observed in animals.[19][20][21][22][23]
Many gay and lesbian people are in committed same-sex relationships, though only recently have census forms and political conditions facilitated their visibility and enumeration.[24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32] These relationships are equivalent to heterosexual relationships in essential psychological respects.[2] Homosexual relationships and acts have been admired, as well as condemned, throughout recorded history, depending on the form they took and the culture in which they occurred.[33] Since the end of the 19th century, there has been a movement towards increased visibility, recognition and legal rights for homosexual people, including the rights to marriage and civil unions, adoption and parenting, employment, military service, and equal access to health care.
