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Research shows elevated gender variance among autistic people and more autistic traits among gender diverse people, each of which is related to mental health concerns. Little work has explored broad features of these presentations in a non-clinical sample. College students (n = 174) ages 18–22 years completed questionnaires assessing the broader autism phenotype (BAP), autistic features, nonconformity to gender norms, and internalizing symptoms. Those with more BAP features or autistic communication reported more nonconformity to gender norms. Higher levels of internalizing symptoms were related to more gender nonconformity, BAP, and autistic features. Gender nonconformity marginally moderated the effect of BAP on depression but not anxiety. The BAP, autistic features, and gender nonconformity are important in understanding mental well-being.

Gendered identities and gender variance have become a regular subject of the discourse of the United Nations human rights protection mechanisms. This article explores the manner in which gender ide...

Gender variance is a broad term used to describe gender non-conforming behaviors. Past studies have used the parental response to Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL) Item 110, which asks whether a child “Wishes to be of opposite sex” as an indicator of gender variance. The population prevalence of gender variance in children and adolescents using this metric was found to be 1.2% in birth-assigned females and 0.4% in birth-assigned males (Achenbach & Rescorla, 2001). However, in those referred for psychiatric evaluation, it was higher (5.4% of birth-assigned females and 2.8% of birth-assigned males) (Achenbach & Rescorla, 2001). The aim of this study was to use the CBCL to estimate the prevalence of gender variance among children and adolescents with neurodevelopmental and psychiatric conditions and assess whether this was higher compared to controls. The response to the CBCL and the child’s neurodevelopmental and/or psychiatric diagnosis were extracted from the clinical notes of 1553 children and adolescents referred to an outpatient psychiatry clinic in Australia. This was compared to data from 181 control participants as well as to the CBCL standardization sample of 1605 controls. Of the 1553 young people, whose mean age was 10.9 years, gender variance was reported in 3.1% compared to 1.7% in local control participants (p > .05) and 0.7% in the CBCL controls (p

Identities that differ from what is expected of each gender challenge the crystallised binary form of social organisation. Furthermore, having a gender-variant child is an experience that confronts parents with something unknown to them that questions most of their assumptions. In the Italian context, there is a lack of awareness about the population of transgender and gender-variant minors, and what their or their families’ needs are. In the present study, we interviewed the parents of gender-variant minors from Italy and asked them to describe the ways they got to know their child’s gender identity and how they managed such a completely new situation. The interviews were transcribed literally and analysed through discourse analysis. We carried out descriptions of how parents configure this topic and the different positionings adopted thorough their experience of understanding and managing gender variance. Overall, we discussed and promoted parent-children interacting modalities aimed at co-constructing and sharing the process of gender identity development, instead of adopting self-referential or ideological positionings. The present article offers a qualitative exploratory study of gender-variant minors and their families in the Italian context. The limitations of the study and suggestions for future research are also presented.

Gender variance in school-aged children is a topic that has only recently started to be discussed amongst educators and educational administrators (del Rio et al. 2014). While the unique needs of children who do not identify as one specific gender or another are plentiful, there is little information and research on how schools can best accommodate these children and young adults (Riley et al 2013). This paper will begin with a literature review that not only defines gender variance and explains key terminology that are often confused, but also will suggest ways that educators and school employees can become advocates for children who identify as gender variant. This literature review will also include information regarding effective professional development methods for K-12 educators. This paper will then analyze existing professional development programs and teacher education syllabi that seek to educate those within an educational community on dimensions of difference with a focus on gender variance. There is a lack of information on what professional development would be most effective in providing members of a school community with resources to best accommodate their students who identify as gender variant, so this paper will seek to provide recommendations on effective development based on the literature review, and the analysis of current professional development programs.

In her debut book Dolore minimo, Giovanna Cristina Vivinetto engages in a reflection on motherhood to recount an autobiographical story of gender self-determination and male to female transition. This article explores Vivinetto’s poetry as the retelling of transformative moments in two mother–daughter relationships, which generate a reshaping of life and language. In the book, these two storylines intersect, blur, and even overlap, creating a poetic discourse in which the maternal acts simultaneously as powerful catalyzer and producer of meanings. In discussing how, in Dolore minimo, the relationship of two atypical mothers becomes the creative site of a new possible symbolic order, my analysis engages an atypical approach: it reads Vivinetto’s queer representation of motherhood via the theorization developed by the women of Diotima—including, in particular, Luisa Muraro, Chiara Zamboni, Diana Sartori, and Ida Dominijanni. These feminist thinkers have been generally criticized for reinforcing binary understandings of sex and gender, based on an essentialist view of the category of woman. Yet, what if the feminism forwarded by Diotima, by positioning the feminine as a creative producer and first-person narrator of change, could still offer a productive avenue for dialogue? The article begins with a discussion of Diotima’s key theorizations, which lays the groundwork for interpreting the maternal poetics of Dolore minimo. The subsequent sections examine in more depth how Vivinetto’s poetry has reinvented the figure of the mother as a teacher and learner of new words, and how, through this reinvention, she has crafted a maternal language that knits together new relations of contiguity and change. Ultimately, by redeploying the figure of the mother beyond cisgender norms, Vivinetto’s poetry is revealing the inexhaustible vitality of this character.

Summary In this article, we discuss the alternate model of consent that has become dominant for the provision of transgender-specific health care within the United States, referred to here as the Standards of Care model. This model, which requires medical professionals to provide official opinions on a transgender patient's readiness to accept and undergo care, stands in contrast to the majority model of medical consent in the US, namely individually provided informed consent. Here, we review the informed consent model, including the basic ethical components of this model and the essential elements of medical decision-making capacity. We then consider the Standards of Care model. We situate its origins in pathological understandings of gender variance and review the current requirements of the model. Consideration is given to logical inconsistencies within the current Standards of Care model, which holds that gender variance is non-pathological and affirming care is medically necessary, but that adult patients requesting such care require psychiatric diagnoses and are unable to consent to their own care. We then consider the bioethical meaning of the Standards of Care model, which others have proposed cedes some of the patient autonomy offered by informed consent for an inflated reliance on nonmaleficence. We align ourselves with this position. We continue this interpretation to suggest that the Standards of Care model ultimately fails to deliver this proffered nonmaleficence.

This article examines the discourse of non-normative sexuality and gender variance in Pakistan produced through commissioned transnational documentaries. While the documentary apparatus is mobilized to make visible gender and sexual minorities in Pakistan, they deploy self-othering schema within which the other is defined in comparison to the Euro-American center and its politics of normative citizenship. Sexual practices and gender embodiments that do not match up to the normative ideals are deemed aberrant and rendered abject, while simultaneously Muslim cultures are metonymically linked with homophobia and oppression. I demonstrate through a close reading of three documentaries that the optics and modalities that they employ do not make intelligible the other and their relationalities but rather circumscribe them. I argue that the discourse is not constituted to empower but instead functions to subordinate, impoverish, and incapacitate the other.

ObjectiveThe aim of this study was to investigate the views of young people (YP) with gender dysphoria and their parents concerning fertility preservation and reproductive and life priorities.DesignA cross-sectional questionnaire-based study assessed knowledge of potential effects of treatments for gender dysphoria on fertility, current and future life priorities and preferences regarding future fertility/parenting options among YP and parents.ResultsA total of 79 YP (81% assigned female at birth [AFAB], 19% assigned male at birth [AMAB], aged 12–18 years, 68% between ages 16 years and 18 years) and 73 parents participated. The top current life priority for YP among eight options was being in good health; the least important priority was having children. Anticipated life priorities 10 years from now were ranked similarly. Parents’ rankings paralleled the YP responses; however, parents ranked having children as a significantly higher priority for AFAB compared with AMAB YP in 10 years. The majority of YP (66% AFAB, 67% AMAB) want to be a parent in the future. However, most do not envision having a biological child. A large majority (72% AFAB, 80% AMAB) were open to adoption. None of the YP surveyed pursued fertility preservation.ConclusionFertility is a low current and future life priority for transgender YP. The majority of YP wish to become parents but are open to alternative strategies for building a family. These data may explain in part the reported low rates of fertility preservation among this population. Further studies are needed to assess if life priorities change over time.

Drawing on transgender, queer and feminist theoretical perspectives, I critically analyze two children’s picture books featuring transgender and gender variant characters. With these critical theoretical perspectives in mind, this discourse analysis examines the ways the books, both visually and textually, depict gender embodiment and the experiences of the characters. Using questions derived from these theoretical lenses, I analyze concepts of power, normalcy, difference, the gender binary, gender fluidity, intelligibility and unintelligibility. These concepts contribute to the dominant discourse of ‘the gaze’, seen in varying ways in the books. Children’s story books largely underrepresent the experiences of transgender characters, particularly books outlining, and explaining, a social gender transition. The majority of picture books with LGBTQ+ themes focus on same sex families and feature boys in dresses, thus centralize around disrupting the constraints of masculinity. I conclude this paper with recommendations for selecting, reading, and discussing books with transgender and gender variant protagonists. The central themes outlined in the academic literature illustrate that ‘the gaze’ and regulation of knowledge have a significant impact on what is visible in children’s books. This may ultimately affect children’s understanding, and appreciation, of gender variance and, hence, social gender transitions in early childhood.

The capacity of transgender to incorporate all gender variance and sexual preferences has become a powerful tool of activism and personal identification. Rather than being an index of marginality "trans" has become a central cultural site. In this paper, I will argue that this identity label encompasses a complex range of internal psychic positions in relation to consciously stated sexual preferences and gender identifications. My aim is to explore what can appear to be in some cases a premature embracement of the empowering potential of the transgender identification through my work with under 18-year-olds who are seeking medical intervention for gender dysphoria. This can undermine the painful psychic work required to establish what transgender means for any given young person. In an external culture where to ask "why transgender" (as opposed to "how transgender") is felt to be pathologising, working with these young people can prove difficult for the analyst. The challenge is to tread the fine line between a dialogue based on an equidistant curiosity about meaning and function that is core to an analytic approach, and a posture of implicit skepticism.

Later age of diagnosis, better expressive behaviors, increased use of camouflage strategies but also increased psychiatric symptoms, more unmet needs, and a general lower quality of life are characteristics often associated with female gender in autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Psychiatric rehabilitation has shown small to moderate effectiveness in improving patients' outcomes in ASD. Few gender differences have been found in the response to psychiatric rehabilitation. This might be related to the predominance of males in research samples, but also to the lack of programs directly addressing women's unmet needs. The objectives of the present paper were: (i) to review the needs for care of autistic women in romantic relationships and reproductive health; (ii) to review the existing psychosocial treatments in these domains; and (iii) to evaluate the strengths and limitations of the current body of evidence to guide future research. A systematic electronic database search (PubMed and PsycINFO), following PRISMA guidelines, was conducted on autistic women's needs for care relating to psychiatric rehabilitation in romantic relationships and reproductive health. Out of 27 articles, 22 reported on romantic relationships and 16 used a quantitative design. Most studies were cross-sectional (n = 21) and conducted in North America or Europe. Eight studies reported on interventions addressing romantic relationships; no published study reported on interventions on reproductive health or parenting. Most interventions did not include gender-sensitive content (i.e., gender variance and gender-related social norms, roles, and expectations). Autistic women and autistic gender-diverse individuals may face unique challenges in the domains of romantic relationships and reproductive health (high levels of stigma, high risk of sexual abuse, increased psychiatric symptoms, and more unmet needs). We discussed the potential implications for improving women's access to psychiatric and psychosocial treatment, for designing gender-sensitive recovery-oriented interventions, and for future research.

Test anxiety has got universal attention of several researchers working in the field of education during recent years due to its positive or negative impact on students’ academic achievements. The current study intended to evaluate the gender variation in test anxiety level at secondary school level in Public Schools in District Quetta. The descriptive research design with quantitative research technique is utilized for data collection. The participants of the research study were 172 (102 boys,70 girls) Students. “Westside Test Anxiety Scale, was used for measuring test anxiety scores. For evaluating the variance among gender in Test anxiety Average scores, an Independent sample t - test was performed with SPSS. The result indicated the prevalence of anxiety in boys and girls, but no statistically significant variation was detected in genders. The finding of the study has educational implication for educational institutes and professional assistance for recommendations educationalists, counsellors and other concern bodies, further the study has fundamental help for students in coping anxiety in evaluative circumstances.

The inaugural chapter explains the purpose of this book by detailing Goh’s project of theologising the Amplify Open and Affirming Conferences. It provides an overview of contemporary ecclesiological concerns before a discussion on the difficult relationship between churches and LGBTIQ issues. Various organisations, including two churches in Hong Kong and Singapore which are also participating churches of Amplify, are featured as examples of open and affirming ecclesial spaces. Before closing with an overview of the chapters, Goh presents a queer matrix of relational empowerment as the general analytical framework of this book.

This chapter investigates the social and cultural changes that have occurred in recent decades in the so-called Western contexts, regarding the way new gendered subjectivities, and new bodies, along with new relationships with the body, have emerged in relation (and also in contrast) to the power and knowledge that have accumulated over time. It investigates the cultural nature of gender binarism, with particular reference to the so-called Western cultures, and at the same time critically reflects on the process of construction of subjectivities through body/mind dualism and changing perspectives on the body. The chapter involves an analysis of the different possible gendered dimensions and forms that are and have been explored by anthropology in various places and times, and introduces the figure of the Neapolitan femminielli.

‘The expression of gender characteristics, including identities, that are not stereotypically associated with one’s assigned sex at birth is a common and culturally diverse human phenomenon (that) should not be judged as inherently pathological or negative.’ 1 Recently the World Health Organization has moved to re-define gender identity-related health and now uses the umbrella term transgender to describe ‘a diverse group of people whose internal sense of gender is different than that which they were assigned at birth’ .2 This term is growing in familiarity globally and does not imply a medical condition. The term includes people living in accordance with their gender identity in the absence of medical treatment and those undergoing gender-affirmative health care to support and affirm their gender identity including those with non-binary gender identities.2 Increasing numbers of people are either gender questioning or identifying as transgender. Accurate epidemiological data are not available on how many people globally identify as gender questioning or transgender but there is evidence that the number of patients accessing gender-affirming health services is increasing.2 This is particularly true for children and adolescents.3 Recent studies suggest that the prevalence of a self-reported transgender identity in children, adolescents, and adults ranges from 0.3% to 2.7%, significantly higher than prevalence estimates based on adult clinic-based referrals.2,3 Furthermore, an expanded definition of gender variance results in higher prevalence estimates.3 However, cultural norms around gender expression may impact on self-report and most of the reported prevalence studies have been conducted in European countries.1,3 There is an increasing focus on the healthcare needs of transgender people.1,2,4 This patient group and their families have specific medical, social, and psychological needs …

The Maml?k jurist ?Abd al-Ra??m al-Isnaw?’s legal manual on the cases involving a khunth? (an intersex person) was comprehensive on matters of religious practice. It allows us to understand the underlying doctrinal strategies that the jurists used in regulating the khunth?’s access to public life. This article attempts to examine specific strategies that al-Isnaw? used in his legal manual’s chapter on ?al?h (ritual prayer). Through an exploration of the doctrines in the chapter affecting a khunth?’s comportment and location, I assess the possible consequences of such doctrines on the life of a khunth?. The major consequence is the khunth?’s social isolation in the name of accommodating them in a community’s mosque by providing a specific row for them. The accommodation requires outing a khunth? as such within the community space, leading to further isolation, even when the khunth? is not a singular subject within the community.

This work retraces the history of gender identity, a construct which came to light at the end of the sixties, and whose path we will follow up until the present day. In detail, the work focuses on the situations in which a person – belonging to what is commonly known as the trans* world – lives with a lack of correspondence between assigned birth gender and actual gender experience. We will revisit the different diagnoses connected to gender variance – in childhood, adolescence and adulthood – that have been put forward, and examine the different diagnostic classifications that have been used up to now, in order to reach the discussion of this theme in a psychoanalytic field. We will highlight how, alongside pathologizing theories, the psychiatric and psychoanalytic fields have become enriched via theoretical and clinical knowledge that enhance and recognize the depth of the subjective experience of trans* people, without stopping therefore, at a simply reductive diagnosis.

It is exactly a decade ago that Sexual and Relationship Therapy published a special issue entitled “Gender Variance and Transgender Identity”, which was guest edited by Walter Bockting, former Edit...

The American Psychiatric Association (APA) is in the process of revising its Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM), with the DSM-V having an anticipated publication date of 2012. As part of that ...

Previous research indicates a link between autism and transgender and gender-diverse identities, though the association is not yet fully understood. The current study examined autistic traits (Autism Spectrum Quotient [AQ]), empathizing (Empathizing Quotient-Short [EQ-S]), and systemizing (Systemizing Quotient-Short [SQ-S]) in a sample of 89 adults and aimed to test whether gender diverse individuals exhibit cognitive profiles consistent with predictions derived from the Extreme Male Brain theory. As most research has considered only cisgender people, we recruited a more diverse sample by contacting >200 UK LGBT+ organizations and posting on social media. A range of non-cisgender identities (e.g., transgender male, transgender female, non-binary, genderqueer, transmasculine) and non-heterosexual orientations (e.g., homosexual, bisexual) were represented, and participants were categorized into one of four groups: (1) assigned female at birth but does not identify as female (transgender AFAB) (n = 32), (2) cisgender female (n = 21), (3) assigned male at birth but does not identify as male (transgender AMAB) (n = 18), and (4) cisgender male (n = 18). After controlling for age and autism diagnostic status, transgender AFAB participants had marginally higher AQ scores, and significantly higher SQ-S and systemizing-relative-to-empathizing (D) scores, compared with the cisgender female group. No such differences were detected between the transgender AMAB and cisgender male groups. Our findings are broadly in line with predictions derived from the Extreme Male Brain theory, though as no transgender AFAB participants reported being heterosexual, it was not possible to determine whether these effects relate specifically to gender identity, to sexual orientation, or to both.

Research points to an association between gender diversity and the clinical characteristics of autism spectrum disorder (ASD)/neurodiversity, and it has been suggested that gender dysphoria (GD) and ASD intersect more frequently than would be estimated by chance. Several hypotheses have been forwarded to explain this potential co-occurrence, but empirical evidence for these hypotheses is lacking. Co-occurring ASD might come with specific challenges in assessment of individuals with gender identity questions. However, there is a clinical consensus that GD and ASD can co-occur independently, and that an ASD diagnosis should not be an exclusion criterion for a GD diagnosis in children and adolescents, nor for gender-affirming medical treatment in adolescents. While exploring gender identity in youth with ASD, it is important to take ASD-specific challenges into account and to adjust the assessment process to their needs. With respect to gender affirmative interventions, a carefully evaluated stepwise approach that takes into account specific ASD characteristics is indicated.

Despite evidence that drug use is higher among lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ) populations, research that explores the gendered and sexual dynamics of LGBTQ substance use is limited. Responding to this opening in the literature, and drawing on 32 qualitative interviews from an Australian study, we consider how LGBTQ consumers pursue particular drug effects to change their experience of gender and/or sexuality. Our analysis suggests that for many consumers, drug use and the experience of intoxication enhances sexual pleasure. In the context of gender variance, intoxication can facilitate free gender expression and, in some cases, palliate bodily discomfort. Acknowledging the generative effects of drug use for gender and sexual transformation, we conclude by commenting on the implications of our analysis for LGBTQ health policy and practice.

This article delves into the topic of informed consent in taking charge of minors with gender variance by medical personnel in general, and psychologists in particular, as well as in these minors’ therapeutic choices. In particular, it aims at answering the question of whether the previously mentioned medical actors can take care of minors and provide them with treatments even without parental consent.