Identify Survey: Community and advocacy report

Abstract

The Identify survey is the largest study focused on rainbow young people (aged 14-26) in Aotearoa New Zealand to date. This survey was live between February and August 2021. The research team is a diverse array of rainbow community youth organisations, leaders and researchers. The research team are united in our belief that excellent survey results can help inform ways in which we can improve rainbow lives in Aotearoa New Zealand and beyond. In total, 4784 rainbow young people and 434 of their allies took part in the survey. The findings in this report are based on the survey responses of rainbow young people. Identify was very successful at generating a wide and diverse sample of rainbow young people, including 2045 (43%) who were currently in secondary education, 1640 (34%) who were in post-secondary education, and 1099 (23%) who were not in education but were either in paid or unpaid employment, or were unemployed. There was a good spread of ethnicities reported, and at a total-response level, 12% were Māori; 4% Pacific; 9% Asian; and 71% Pākehā, NZ European, or another European identity. There were also around 1% respectively of participants who were Middle Eastern, Latin American, African, or North American. For this age bracket, this distribution is disproportionally white and underrepresents Pacific populations, which is a limitation we recognise in our recommendations. Participants reported a wide array of gender identities and modalities. Broadly, 52% of participants were classified as cisgender women/girls (39%) or men/ boys (13%), 14% as trans men/boys or trans women/girls, 30% as non-binary and 4% as questioning their gender. Similarly, a wide array of sexualities was reported. Participants with intersex variations or variations of sex characteristics were also registered, accounting for approximately 1% of the cohort. Just over two in five participants were identified as disabled.