The number of Americans who openly identify as LGBT has hit a record high after increasing for the sixth year in a row, according to a new study.

Gallup – a research-based consultant company, known for its opinion polls worldwide – recently released new data that showed a record-breaking 4.5 of Americans surveyed identified as LGBT.

As part of the daily tracking performed by the major polling company, Gallup spoke to over 340,000 people in 2017.

In their polls, Gallup found that 4.5 percent of the population identified as LGBT, an increase from 4.1 percent in 2016.

The company began to ask whether survey-takers identified as LGBT in 2012 and has seen an increase every year since.

In 2012, 3.5 percent of the adults surveyed identified as LGBT, compared to 3.7 percent in 2014.

This research discovered a gap between how different genders identify, with 5.1 percent of women identifying as LGBT, compared with 3.9 percent of men.

If 4.5 percent of the adult population of the US were LGBT, as this study indicates, it would mean that over 11 million adults in the US would currently identify as LGBT.

Gallup also found that there was a significant generational gap in how people identify.

The increase in Americans identifying as LGBT has been driven mainly by millennials, which Gallup records as those born between 1980 and 1999.

Gallup’s data showed that the percentage of LGBT millennials increased from 7.3 percent in 2016 to 8.1 percent in 2017 – up from 5.8 percent in 2012, when the company started research on the issue.

The Gallup surveys also included respondents born between 1913-1945.

1.4 percent of people aged 72 or older identified as LGBT, showing no change from 2016, according to the Gallup research.

Gallup also measured people who identified as LGBT by household income and by race and ethnicity.

The survey found that people with lower incomes were more likely to openly identify as LGBT, as they had seen every year since the start of polling about sexuality in 2012.

The results from another recent poll by Gallup marked the highest level of support the firm has ever recorded in more than 20 years of asking Americans about their views on the issue.

Gallup first surveyed Americans on the same-sex union in 1996. Back then, just 27 percent of those queried supported gay marriage.

However, according to the 2017 data, 67 percent of Americans support marriage equality.

The new data showed that 83 percent of those who classed themselves as Democrats said they support legally recognised same-sex marriage – compared to less than half (44 percent) of Republic respondents.

One of the most controversial legal defences has been used successfully once again.

On Thursday, a 69-year-old man was convicted of criminally negligent homicide after stabbing his neighbour to death in 2015.

James Miller will serve 10 years probation after the death of his neighbour Daniel Spencer, in addition to six months in prison.

According to NBC, friends Spencer and Miller were together in Austin, Texas, when Spencer made a sexual advance on him.

“Hold it, I’m not a gay person,” Miller reportedly replied.

The defence argued that Miller acted in self-defence.

However, the prosecution argued that Miller did not have “so much as a scratch on him.”

Miller reportedly told the jury: “He had height advantage over me, arm length over me, youth over me. I felt he was going to hurt me.”

Miller then stabbed Spencer before turning himself into the authorities.

In addition to the 10 years on probation, Judge Brad Urrutia added the maximum judge-imposed sentence of six months imprisonment as well as 100 hours of community service and $11,000 in restitution to Spencer’s family.

Prosecutor Matthew Foye said that the verdict showed that the self-defence claim was not successful in acquitting Miller.

Foye said: “It establishes that Daniel Spencer was a victim of a senseless killing by the defendant and he did not do anything to bring this upon himself.

“Since the defence’s strategy was to argue self-defence, I think the jury’s verdict makes it clear that they did not believe it was self-defence.”

Miller’s representative Charlie Baird said he was disappointed with the decision to convict him of criminally negligent homicide.

“We thought that he should have been acquitted on the basis of self-defence,” Baird told NBC,  before adding that he was glad Miller would not have an extended prison sentence.

Baird said: “The jury, they agreed with us and thought that Mr. Miller was no threat to the community or to society at large, and, therefore, they decided to place him on community supervision.”

Many are reporting that this case is a prime example of the so-called “gay panic” defence in action.

Related: Man who shot and killed gay admirer freed from prison after 22 years

This legal defence means that assailants who attack gay men after seeing homosexual behaviour may argue in court that they could not reasonably control their actions.

It relies on a largely discredited medical idea that many men will have a natural, biological response of rage when witnessing gay behaviour, which will make their actions uncontrollable.

Monica Harrell, a chairperson for Equal Rights Washington, explained: “[The defence] is saying you’re surprised that somebody might be different than you, whatever that difference is, and that that would allow you to initiate violence, and in some cases, lethal violence. That should never be a defence.”

As of 2018, only two states have currently outlawed the ‘gay panic’ defence – Illinois and California.

These laws also prohibit the ‘trans panic’ defence, which has been used by men who discover that their sexual partner is not a cisgender woman.

But LGBT rights advocates are aiming to repeat their triumph in Illinois in half a dozen states during 2018, according to the Associated Press.

Lawmakers in Illinois have pushed forward a bill that would require schools to teach LGBT history to students in the state.

The state looks set to approve a bill that would require all public elementary and high schools to teach “the significant role of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) individuals in society.”

The bill was given its second reading earlier this week and was later supported by the state’s education committee with an 8-2 vote.

However, it does not mandate how much time is to be spent on teaching LGBT history, leaving the decision up to local school boards and authorities.

The bill has been sponsored by state Senator Heather Steans and has been welcomed by LGBT groups in the state.

People need to see their history to understand that they are a part of our society,” Illinois state Senator Heather Steans told The Hill.

Brian Johnson, CEO of the LGBT organisation Equality Illinois, said the bill would help widen pupils’ understanding of the world and promote acceptance of LGBT people.

“People learn about Jane Addams, [the founder of social work as a job in the United States], for example, but don’t know she’s a lesbian.

“We don’t think there is true justice for the LGBT community unless we can learn about our history.”

However, conservative groups have hit back against the proposed legislation, with one group calling it an “indoctrination bill.”

“The left’s motive is what it always is: it is to normalise homosexuality,” said Laurie Higgins, on behalf of the Illinois Family Institute.

If the bill passes, Illinois will become only the second US state to require LGBT history as part of their curriculum.

As of 2018, California is the only state that requires LGBT inclusive history education.

In 2016, the California Board of Education unanimously approved changing instructions given to teachers to comply with a new state law that requires public schools to include historic gay Americans and mark LGBT milestones.

If the Illinois bill is passed, it is expected to be implemented in all public elementary and high schools from this July.

The hometown of anti-gay Vice President Mike Pence will host its first ever Pride festival in an effort to distance themselves from the former governor.

Erin Bailey, a high school student, has organised the Columbus Pride Festival in an effort to prove that Mike Pence does not represent all of his hometown.

“I feel it is important for members of the LGBTQ community to know that Columbus is a welcoming and diverse community,” Bailey said to Huff Post.

“Even though Mike Pence is openly anti-gay, that doesn’t mean that all of us in his hometown are.”

Earlier this year Pence took to Twitter to call this record ‘fake news’, after being criticised by self-titled icon Adam Rippon.

The event is planned for April 14 and will be the first of its kind to be hosted Columbus, a small city with under 50,000 people.

Organiser Erin Bailey, a student of Columbus Signature Academy-New Tech, also said that as well as welcoming LGBT people to Columbus, the event could help distance the liberal-leaning town from the ultra-conservative Veep.

The 18-year-old said: “We are so much more than just a small town that he grew up in.”

“It is important for this event to be happening now so that others know that even in this time of hatred, we don’t all agree with it. This is an opportunity to show support for an all-inclusive community.

“This is something incredibly important to me, and I want to make a difference in not only our small Indiana community but in the world as well. Gay rights are human rights.”

Other LGBT+ groups in Columbus have welcomed the plans as the first of their kind, though they are by far the first pro-LGBT movement in Columbus, according to Pride Alliance Columbus.

“As an ally, it’s very important to me that Erin’s event, as wonderful as it is, is not seen in a vacuum. PAC has been in existence for almost 20 years, and our mission is inclusion for all,” said Pride Alliance Columbus’ president Jill Tasker.

This isn’t the first bit of potentially bad news for the anti-LGBT Vice President this month.

On St Patrick’s Day, LGBT activists in Georgia welcomed Pence to town with sea of rainbow flags, ensuring that in every photo Pence posed for, a rainbow flag could be seen.

Last week Pence’s family released a book about their bunny, titled “Marlon Bundo’s Day in the Life of the Vice President”.

As part of a wider segment about the Vice President’s anti-LGBT policies and support for Donald Trump, comedian John Oliver announced that a gay parody of the Pence family’s book was being released by his show Last Week Tonight.

Since the release, the book became the number-one bestseller on Amazon – three places above the Pences’ book.

Oliver later revealed to Ellen DeGeneres on her show, the book has now sold out.

“Unfortunately we have sold out because we were not anticipating people really buying it,” Oliver said.

The book is expected to be reprinted next month.