Are we comparing apples and oranges? Same-sex couples and sexual orientation in surveys in Latin America

The data collected regarding gender and sexuality are important tool for addressing social inequalities in the population. Although, several efforts have been made to measure sexual minorities in different countries there is still no consensus as to the best way of obtaining this information. To this extent, we compare three groups: individuals in same-sex couples, individuals in different-sex couples who do not identify as LGB, and unpartnered LGB individuals and unpartnered non-LGB. By using the same datasets to look at these groups across three contexts we will be able to show the effect of choosing a sexuality measure and whether this choice is more consequential in some countries than in others.The preliminary results point to the need of studies regarding how the instruments that measure sexual minorities in large population surveys can influence estimates of their sociodemographic composition and inequalities based on sexuality in outcomes such as wellbeing and economic welfare. To this end, this study proposes a cross-country (Chile, Colombia and Brazil) comparison in order to find points of similarity among the surveys as well as factors that could be related to the specificity of each social context.