Dear Catherine, The word 'data' can actually be used with both singular and plural verbs (data suggest/suggests). Still, the singular form is more common, I would say. Therefore, 'the data suggests'. By the way, it is better to say 'people OF our gender'.

Datum (a single information / information about one entity) is the singular noun; data is its plural form (aggregation of multiple datum/ information about multiple entities). By grammatical convention, this is how it should be written/said --> datum suggests and data suggest. However, most of the times "data suggests" is used as they refer to a single large piece of information which in turn can be split into multiple small datum. So, the choice is yours. I think suggest/suggests are both acceptable. Another example --- a group of people (like sports team, army) can have single or plural verbs. For example --> 1) Real Madrid showed that it is a good team. 2) Real Madrid showed that they are a good team. Here both 1) and 2) are grammatically correct & they convey the same meaning. The case with data can be considered in similar light.

suggests. I/we would 'suggest', but data/research etc it is 'suggests'.