The Kinsey Institute is a controversial research institution that studies human sexuality and sexual behavior. Located at Indiana University, the Institute pushes broadly left-of-center and socially liberal views on sexuality and gender identity.

The Institute was founded by and is named after sex researcher Alfred Kinsey, whose work has garnered controversy for questionable research methods and that some claim helped to foment the sexual revolution. ^{1 2 3}

Founding and Organization

In 1938, Alfred Kinsey, a zoologist, began teaching a course on marriage at Indiana University. This eventually led to Kinsey researching human sexuality. He received a $40,000 grant from the National Research Council’s Committee for Research on the Problems of Sex, which was in turn funded by the Rockefeller Foundation, in 1947. Kinsey founded the Institute for Sex Research as a nonprofit organization. Kinsey would direct this institute until his death in 1956. In 1981, it was renamed the Kinsey Institute for Sex Research, and then later the Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender and Reproduction. In 2016 the Institute was absorbed into Indiana University and became known as the Kinsey Institute, Indiana University. ⁴

Alfred Kinsey

Alfred Kinsey left behind an extremely controversial legacy. He is credited with founding the field of sex studies; critics, especially social conservative ones, have accused his work of promoting sexually promiscuous, deviant, and anti-traditional behavior. His methods of research have also been criticized, with some claiming that Kinsey’s work has provided the foundation for decades of faulty sexual education courses and curriculums used in schools around the country. ^{5 6}

A particular source of controversy over Kinsey’s work is its reliance on the testimony and diaries of a pedophile. Kinsey was in communication with a man who practiced incest, pedophilia, and zoophilia and used the man’s recollections and diary extensively in his work. Kinsey never turned the man in, and in his published research, lied and divided the details provided by this singular person up into several different fictitious people who did not exist, and claimed that several of them were “technically trained persons,” whereas the actual singular man did not have any technical training. This single man was responsible for providing 317 anecdotes on the sexual capacity of young boys that Kinsey published in his report on male sexuality. This deception was revealed by the then-head of the Kinsey Institute in 1995. ⁷

Kinsey engaged in odd behavior, notably circumcising himself with a pocket knife a year or two before his death. While married to a woman, Kinsey had affairs with men and encouraged his staff at the Institute to have open marriages, and also filmed sex acts in his home. ⁸

The Kinsey Institute as of 2023 had several statements on its website defending Kinsey and his research methods, claiming that it is “disinformation” to suggest that Kinsey ever experimented on children or encouraged those whom he was interviewing to do so. ⁹ However, the Institute has not made all of Kinsey’s original research available to the public, and a Washington Post story from 1995 reported that the Institute’s then-director would not allow researchers to attempt to unmask the pseudonym of the pedophile whom Kinsey interviewed and with whom he corresponded; ¹⁰ the person was subsequently publicly identified. ¹¹

Funding

The fiscal year ending on June 30, 2016, was the last full year of the Kinsey Institute’s operation as an independent nonprofit organization before it merged with Indiana University. That year, the Institute reported $238,963 in revenue, of which $144,373 was derived from contributions and grants, and $93,163 was derived from investment income. In that fiscal year, it reported no salary and compensation expenses, in contrast to the previous year—when $174,915. $217,876 of its expenses were allocated to “other” expenses, including, $120,580 in management expenses and $41,725 in art and library expenses. It ended the year with $1,717,526 in net assets. ^{12 13}

In 2016, the Institute was dissolved as an independent nonprofit and merged with Indiana University, after which it no longer filed financial disclosure forms with the IRS. In May 2023, the Indiana State Legislature passed a budget that prohibited the use of state funds for the Kinsey Institute. ^{14 15}

Research

The Kinsey Institute’s most-notable research products are Alfred Kinsey’s volumes on sexuality in males and females that are often credited with contributing to the “sexual revolution” of the 1960s through the present. However, there are many questions about the validity of Kinsey’s research methods, including an instance where Kinsey allegedly lied about a research subject and the data he acquired from that subject, though the Institute asserts that Kinsey “did not falsify research findings.” ¹⁶

The contemporary Kinsey Institute is focused on a wide variety of research projects related to human sexuality and behavior. This includes contraceptive use, trauma, and “gender equity in business.” ¹⁷ One research project conducted in partnership with Match.com found that the reversal of Roe v. Wade by the Supreme Court had led to 20 percent of the study’s single participants stating they would be more hesitant to have sex. ¹⁸

Leadership

Justin Garcia is the executive director of the Kinsey Institute, a position he has held since 2019. He is also a professor in the department of gender studies at Indiana University. ¹⁹ In the wake of the State of Indiana forbidding government funding to the Kinsey Institute in 2023, Garcia wrote an op-ed in the Washington Post in which he lamented the withdrawal of funding, characterizing it as an attack on academic freedom and complaining that the “culture wars” were restricting abortion, the spread of transgender ideology, and socially liberal sex education. ²⁰

1. “Kinsey Institute Frequently Asked Questions.” KinseyInstitute.org. Accessed May 29, 2023. https://kinseyinstitute.org/about/kinsey-institute-faq.php.
2. Fisher, Marc. “KINSEY REPORT, FAST AND LOOSE?” Washington Post, December 8, 1995. Accessed May 29, 2023. https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1995/12/08/kinsey-report-fast-and-loose/b058e754-34c5-4c62-87fb-7ee1cd42d625/.
3. Crain, Caleb. “Alfred Kinsey: Liberator or Pervert?” The New York Times, October 3, 2004, sec. Arts. Accessed May 29, 2023. https://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/03/movies/alfred-kinsey-liberator-or-pervert.html.
4. “Learn Our History.” Kinsey Institute Indiana University. Accessed June 8, 2023. https://kinseyinstitute.org/about/history/index.php.
5. Fisher, Marc. “KINSEY REPORT, FAST AND LOOSE?” Washington Post, December 8, 1995. Accessed May 29, 2023. https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1995/12/08/kinsey-report-fast-and-loose/b058e754-34c5-4c62-87fb-7ee1cd42d625/.
6. Crain, Caleb. “Alfred Kinsey: Liberator or Pervert?” The New York Times, October 3, 2004, sec. Arts. Accessed May 29, 2023. https://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/03/movies/alfred-kinsey-liberator-or-pervert.html.
7. Fisher, Marc. “KINSEY REPORT, FAST AND LOOSE?” Washington Post, December 8, 1995. Accessed May 29, 2023. https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1995/12/08/kinsey-report-fast-and-loose/b058e754-34c5-4c62-87fb-7ee1cd42d625/.
8. Crain, Caleb. “Alfred Kinsey: Liberator or Pervert?” The New York Times, October 3, 2004, sec. Arts. Accessed May 29, 2023. https://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/03/movies/alfred-kinsey-liberator-or-pervert.html.
9. “Kinsey Institute Frequently Asked Questions.” KinseyInstitute.org. Accessed May 29, 2023. https://kinseyinstitute.org/about/kinsey-institute-faq.php.
10. Fisher, Marc. “KINSEY REPORT, FAST AND LOOSE?” Washington Post, December 8, 1995. Accessed May 29, 2023. https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1995/12/08/kinsey-report-fast-and-loose/b058e754-34c5-4c62-87fb-7ee1cd42d625/.
11. Crain, Caleb. “Alfred Kinsey: Liberator or Pervert?” The New York Times, October 3, 2004, sec. Arts. Accessed May 29, 2023. https://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/03/movies/alfred-kinsey-liberator-or-pervert.html.
12. “Kinsey History.” KinseyInstitute.org. Accessed May 29, 2023. https://kinseyinstitute.org/about/history/index.php.
13. Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender, and Reproduction, Return of Organization Exempt from Income Tax (Form 990), 2015 https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/356042524/201741359349307654/full
14. DeJong, Carter. “Indiana Gov. Holcomb Expected to Sign Budget Banning Funds to Kinsey Institute.” Indiana Daily Student, May 3, 2023. Accessed May 29, 2023.  https://www.idsnews.com/article/2023/05/indiana-budget-alfred-kinsey-kinsey-institute-funding-iu
15. “Kinsey History.” KinseyInstitute.org. Accessed May 29, 2023. https://kinseyinstitute.org/about/history/index.php.
16. Fisher, Marc. “KINSEY REPORT, FAST AND LOOSE?” Washington Post, December 8, 1995. Accessed May 29, 2023. https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1995/12/08/kinsey-report-fast-and-loose/b058e754-34c5-4c62-87fb-7ee1cd42d625/.
17. “Research.” KinseyInstitute.org. Accessed May 29, 2023. https://kinseyinstitute.org/research/index.php.
18. Wharton, Caroline. “One Good Thing from the Creepy Kinsey Institute: Study Shows Singles Date More Thoughtfully Since Fall of Roe.” Students For Life of America, February 17, 2023. Accessed May 29, 2023. https://studentsforlife.org/2023/02/17/one-good-thing-from-the-creepy-kinsey-institute-study-shows-singles-date-more-thoughtfully-since-fall-of-roe/.
19. “Justin R. Garcia.” KinseyInstitute.org. Accessed May 29, 2023. https://kinseyinstitute.org/about/profiles/jgarcia.php.
20. “Opinion | Culture Warriors Strike at Kinsey Institute, the Heart of Sex Research – The Washington Post.” Washington Post, May 10, 2023. Accessed May 29, 2023.  https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/05/10/kinsey-institute-indiana-legislature-state-funds/