Homosexual men have a higher mean birth order than do heterosexual men
, primarily because they have a greater number of older brothers. The
purpose of this study was to determine whether the same difference occ
urs in homosexual vs heterosexual women. The probands were 964 homosex
ual and heterosexual, male and female volunteers, from whom birth orde
r data were collected with self-administered questionnaires. The homos
exual men had more older brothers than the heterosexual men, but they
did not have more older sisters, younger brothers, or younger sisters.
The homosexual women did not differ from the heterosexual women with
regard to any class of sibling. These results are consistent with the
hypothesis that the high birth order of homosexual men reflects the pr
ogressive immunization of certain mothers to H-Y antigen by succeeding
male fetuses, and the increasing effects of H-Y antibodies on sexual
differentiation of the brain in succeeding male fetuses.