The Journal of College and University Student Housing - Volume 42, No. 2 - 89

Implementation of Gender-Neutral Housing

Five barriers to implementing genderneutral housing have been encountered to
roughly the same extent: lack of suitable
housing facilities, parent/family concerns,
public relations concerns, lack of upper-level
administrative support, and lack of expressed
student interest. Miyamoto (2007) reported
that campuses that had or were contemplating
GNH were "wary of complaints from parents
and too much publicity about the policy" (p.
47) but also reported that campuses interviewed had received "minimal" complaints
from parents (p. 46). Ninety-three percent
of respondents who indicated that they had
some form of GNH reported that less than
25% of their on-campus residents lived in
some type of gender-neutral housing, which
would indicate that student interest/demand
is not particularly high. These ﬁndings are
consistent with those of Willoughby et al.
(2012), who reported, "When universities did
have anecdotal information, most universities
suggested that [fewer] than 50 students a year
utilized gender-neutral housing" (p. 742).
One barrier expressed by 28% of respondents in the current study concerned the
existence of suitable housing facilities for
implementing GNH. Despite this concern,
ﬁndings indicate that all types of housing are
being used for this option. Both the quantitative ﬁndings and the analysis of policies
indicated that suites and apartments are the
most common type of housing used for GNH,
which is consistent with what Oliver and
Magura (2011) reported: "Suite-style facilities are a popular option for gender-neutral
housing because of the private or semi-private
bathrooms" (p. 41). Krum et al. (2013) found
that apartment-style housing was the most

preferred type of GNH for the college-age
transgender students they studied. The preferred housing type could indicate a desire for
greater privacy in bedrooms as well as bathrooms for transgender students in GNH.

Limitations
The present study represents the largest, most
comprehensive, and most systematic investigation to date of gender-neutral housing
implementation at colleges and universities
in the U.S. However, some limitations should
be noted. Non-response is the most signiﬁcant
limitation. Although the researchers had hoped
to make some analysis of GNH in international
institutions, the very small number of their responses made comparisons not possible. Similarly, the lack of respondents from Historically
Black Colleges and Universities meant that at
least one important segment of the higher
education landscape was not represented in
the ﬁndings, which limits any generalizations
that could be drawn about these institutions.
Because more than one response was permitted to several of the questions, overall totals
frequently sum to greater than 100%, making
analysis difﬁcult. Responses to the question
about housing types, drawn directly from the
original DeCoster research, were particularly
difﬁcult to interpret; the survey method did not
enable us to clarify with respondents what these
(and other) responses meant.

Implications for Future Research
The researchers plan to build upon the ﬁndings
of this study with continued follow-up to track
the growth of gender-neutral housing in much
the same way that DeCoster (1979) tracked
the development and spread of coeducational
housing options. This will enable the research-

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The Journal of College and University Student Housing - Volume 42, No. 2

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