The share of young Americans identifying as “nonbinary” has fallen sharply over the past two years, reversing a trend that had been steadily growing, according to new national survey data analyzed by University of Buckingham politics professor Eric Kaufmann.
Kaufmann’s report, “The Decline of Trans and Queer Identity among Young Americans,” draws on multiple student surveys, including data from the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), private college-prep school Phillips Academy Andover in Massachusetts, Brown University in Rhode Island, the Higher Education Research Institute (HERI), and surveys of high school students from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
In the FIRE, Andover, and Brown University surveys, Kaufmann found significant declines in the number of individuals who identify as “nonbinary” (neither male nor female).
FIRE’s 2025 survey of more than 50,000 U.S. undergraduates found that only 3.6% identified as “nonbinary,” down from 5.2% in 2024 and 6.8% in both 2022 and 2023.
“In other words, the share of trans-identified students has effectively halved in just two years,” Kaufmann wrote in an Unherd article discussing his findings.
At Andover, just 3% of students in 2025 identified as a gender other than male or female, compared with 7.4% in 2023. Brown University saw a similar drop, from 5% in 2022 and 2023 to 2.6% in 2025.
Notably, the data does not account for “transgender” individuals who identify as either male or female.
Kaufmann said the findings suggest a broader shift among Gen Z away from previously rising rates of nonbinary and queer identification. His report noted that the trend was consistent across both high school and college populations.
Meanwhile, the number of students identifying as heterosexual increased by roughly 10 percentage points since 2023, while gay and lesbian identification remained stable, the data showed.
Reflecting on the reason for this drop, Kaufmann observed that while students’ political and religious beliefs have held steady through the 2020s, the decline may be linked in part to improving mental health trends.
The percentage of students reporting anxiety dropped from about 40% in 2023 to under 30% in 2025. Reported depression fell from more than 15% to around 10% in the same period.
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