State Nondiscrimination Policies With Sexual Orientation Protections Reduce Bullying Among LGB High School Students

• In Event: Investigating the Impacts of Gender and Sexual Orientation on Policy

Abstract

Drawing on pooled cross-sectional data across 22 states from the 2015-2021 Youth Risk Behavior Survey and the American Community Survey, this study leverages a difference-in-differences approach to identify the causal effect of state nondiscrimination policies that enumerate sexual orientation protections on rates of LGB students being bullied at school and attempting suicide. Preliminary results suggest that LGB students in states that added sexual orientation as a protected class from discrimination in schools experience a statistically significant reduction in bullying, but not attempted suicide, over two years. State policies that prohibit discrimination in schools based on students’ sexual orientation act as a reparative solution to reducing LGB students’ exposure to harm in schools.

Author

• Erin Gill, University of Pennsylvania