Bisexual Men “actually exist” research shock

New scientific research hot off the presses in the USA shows that there really are bisexual men after all. This exciting news, opening up a whole new swathe of potential readers for BCN, will surely transform how our readers see human sexuality.

Oh, alright, it won’t. We’ve known about them for years. Lots of you out there in BCN reader land are bi men, and we all know it. But in the academic circles which produced the ropey research that led to the “Gay, straight or lying” headline after supposedly proving that all (or most) men who said they were bisexual weren’t really, this is a pretty positive development. As a bonus, this finding comes from Northwestern University, which was the source of the previous “there’s no such thing” report.

It turns out that recruiting from places where bis hang out (bi websites and publications) produces a better chance of finding a ‘real’ bisexual than recruiting from gay spaces does. Whoever would have thought?

That said, the research was still significantly based on measuring erectile response to a series of short porn clips – so for all we might prefer this set of findings, they may still be telling us more about the quality of the videos used, or whether the participants like strangers in lab coats attaching probes to their privates.

The new Northwestern study was part-funded by the American Institute of Bisexuality, which presented an update on the research work it was supporting at BiReCon last summer.

The New York Times put forward its bid for entertaining bi headline of the year in reporting this story, with “No Surprise for Bisexual Men: Report Indicates They Exist” – a welcome u-turn after being home to the “Gay, Straight Or Lying” story a few years ago.