SPRINGDALE — Gay and lesbian Arkansans have convinced U.S. Sen. Mark Pryor their sexual orientation is a characteristic, not a choice, the senator said Friday.

“I got the question recently on whether I think people are born gay or whether they choose to be,” Pryor said in an interview Friday. He referred to a recent article in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, published March 28. The senator’s statement at the time was he “didn’t know the ‘ultimate’ answer but that he believed that homosexuality is a choice, not a characteristic people are born with.”

Since that remark, Pryor has examined the issue intently for the first time, he said Friday: “When I was asked that, I hadn’t really thought that through. Since then, I’ve talked to a lot of friends in the gay and lesbian community. They feel very, very strongly they were born that way. I’m not going to dispute that. Some have shared in a very personal way things they have gone through in their lives. I appreciate their patience with me and I appreciate their understanding.”

The senator had met with health care providers and community leaders in Northwest Arkansas on Friday. He agreed to an interview after those meetings.

“I just haven’t talked to people about that,” Pryor said of sexual orientation. “I know there is some science about it, I just haven’t spent a lot of time thinking about it before. I don’t think that’s unusual. I’m not gay so I’ve not spent a lot of time thinking about it.”

Gay and lesbian Arkansans have not convinced him to support gay marriage, however, the senator said.

“We don’t agree on marriage equality,” Pryor said, reiterating his stance marriage is between one man and one woman.

A challenge of the federal Defense of Marriage Act of 1996 is currently before the U.S. Supreme Court. The law restricts inter-state recognition of marriage to marriages of people of the opposite sex. A California law banning gay marriage is also before the court. Since those cases were argued before the court, a number of U.S. Senators have declared their support, in principle, of marriage rights for same-sex couples. Pryor remains one of four Democratic senators who have not declared support of equality before the law of same-sex marriage.

Pryor faces a re-election bid in 2014. He is the last remaining Democrat in the state’s Congressional delegation, which consisted of five Democrats and one Republican as recently as 2010. Arkansas voters approved an amendment banning gay marriage in 2004. The measure passed with 75 percent of the vote.

“It sounds to me like the senator’s where a lot of Arkansans are: coming to a form of acceptance but not ready to join where the slim majority of the nation is right now and support gay marriage,” said Janine Parry, a political science professor and researcher for the University of Arkansas.

Arkansans as a whole are not as prone to severely condemn gay marriage as they once were but are not to the point of accepting it either, she said. The senator’s attitude is close to where the majority of Arkansans would stand on this issue, she said.