Publications - Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity

LGBT Navajos Discover Unexpected Champions: Their Grandparents, by Laurel Morales, NPR, Jan 26 2019.

“Nationwide, the share of gay, lesbian and bisexual teens who attempt suicide is high — 23 percent. For Navajo LGBTQ youth, the rate is 70 percent, according to the Navajo Nation's Diné Policy Institute. [...] It's not unusual that Navajo grandparents are accepting of being LGBT while parents are not. Historians say federally run boarding schools and other assimilation tactics taught a generation of Navajos that same-sex relationships are wrong. ”

Even with insurance, getting mental health treatment is a struggle in Mass., study says, by Liz Kowalczyk, Boston Globe, Dec 11 2018.

“Massachusetts residents who need health care are colliding with a hard reality: Having medical insurance doesn’t guarantee you can get treatment, particularly for psychiatric problems. More than half of adults who sought mental health or addiction treatment in recent months had difficulty getting that care, according to a survey of 2,201 residents by the Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts Foundation in Boston...The obstacle wasn’t a lack of insurance; the vast majority of patients were insured. Rather, the problem was that providers either did not accept their insurance or their practices were closed to new patients. ”

LGBT youth at higher risk for suicide attempts, by Linda Carroll, Reuters, Oct 8 2018.

“LGBT adolescents are more likely than other kids their age to try to kill themselves, a new analysis confirms. Data pooled from 35 earlier studies show that sexual minority youth were more than three times as likely to attempt suicide as heterosexual peers, researchers report in JAMA Pediatrics. Transsexual youth were at highest risk, nearly six times as likely to attempt suicide as heterosexual peers, researchers reported. ”

Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual Youth at Increased Risk of Using Multiple Substances, by Janice Wood, Psych Central, Sep 16 2018.

“Young people who identify as lesbian, gay, or bisexual are at increased risk of using substances such as alcohol, nicotine, and marijuana, according to a new study. The study from researchers at Oregon State University also found that these teens are at a higher risk of using more than one substance, known as polysubstance use...Among youth, alcohol, marijuana, and nicotine are the three most commonly used drugs. That is a concern because kids who use those substances are at risk of negative health and social outcomes, including addiction and poor cognitive, social and academic function, the researcher noted. ”

Religious faith linked to suicidal behavior in LGBQ adults, by Anne Harding, Reuters, Apr 13 2018.

“Although religiosity is generally tied to reduced suicide risk, the opposite may be true for some young lesbian, gay and questioning adults, researchers say. Based on data from more than 21,000 U.S. college students, researchers found that greater religious feeling and engagement was tied to increased risk of suicidal thoughts and actions for participants who identified as LGBQ...Questioning youth had the highest rate of recent thoughts about suicide, at 16.4 percent, compared with 3.7 percent of heterosexuals, 6.5 percent of lesbian/gay individuals and 11.4 percent of bisexuals. ”

Using transgender youths' chosen names may lower suicide risk, by Rachel Gurevich , Reuters, Apr 10 2018.

“When a transgender youth chooses a new name, it’s important for friends, relatives and acquaintances to use that chosen name, a new study suggests.  For those who selected a different name from the one given at birth, being called by the chosen name reduced depressive symptoms and overall suicidal risk, researchers found.  The reduction in mental health risks was strongest when the chosen name was used in multiple contexts, like at home, at school, at work, and among friends. ”

Impossible Perfection, by Daniel Summers, Slate, Mar 30 2018.

“Earlier this year, a survey conducted jointly by the Trevor Project, the National Eating Disorders Association (NEDA), and Reasons Eating Disorder Center reported a shockingly high rate of eating disorders among LGBTQ youth. Of the 1,034 respondents to the survey, all LGBTQ-identifying people between 13–24 years old, 54 percent had been diagnosed with an eating disorder, and an additional 21 percent suspected they may have one despite lacking a formal diagnosis. While these results aren’t perfectly representative, they call much-needed attention to a serious problem within our community.  ”

Written on the Body: Letters from Trans and Non-Binary Survivors of Sexual Assault and Domestic Violence, by Edited by Lexie Bean. Foreword and additional pieces by Dean Spade, Nyala Moon, Alex Valdes, Sawyer DeVuyst and Leshai Bailey., Mar 21 2018.

“Written by and for trans and non-binary survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault, Written on the Body offers support, guidance and hope for those who struggle to find safety at home, in the body, and other unwelcoming places. This collection of letters written to body parts weaves together narratives of gender, identity, and abuse. It is the coming together of those who have been fragmented and often met with disbelief. The book holds the concerns and truths that many trans people share while offering space for dialogue and reclamation. ”

Sexual orientation top risk for suicidal thoughts in college freshmen, by Cheryl Platzman Weinstock, Reuters, Mar 15 2018.

“ Nearly one third of first-year college students have thought about suicide, according to a study across eight countries, and non-heterosexual identity or feelings were the biggest risks for this kind of thinking or behavior. Having a religion other than Christianity, being female, having unmarried parents or at least one deceased parent and being age 20 or older were also important risk factors, though being a sexual minority also carried the highest risk of transitioning from suicidal thoughts to plans to attempts, the researchers found. ”

Trans teens may not get care they need, by Lisa Rapaport, Reuters, Feb 5 2018.

“Transgender teens may be more likely to miss preventive health checkups and have untreated medical problems than their non-transgender peers, a U.S. study suggests...Overall, transgender adolescents were almost twice as likely as other teens to report their health as “poor, fair or good” as opposed to “very good or excellent,” the study found...“When youth present differently than what society would expect for their birth-assigned sex, they often receive messages in society that they are behaving in a way that is ‘wrong’ or that they are ‘wrong’ in some way," said lead study author Nic Rider, a human sexuality researcher at the University of Minnesota Medical School in Minneapolis. ”

'Who's Going to Believe Me?'—Why It's So Hard to Talk About Domestic Abuse in LGBTQ Relationships, by Seema Yasmin, SELF.com, Dec 22 2017.

“Some patterns of abuse are the same across straight and LGBTQ relationships, with abusers aiming to disempower, disenfranchise, and hurt their partners. But there are distinct forms of abuse in queer relationships. ”

Teen sexual identity, childhood trauma linked to suicidal behaviors, by Shereen Lehman, Reuters, Dec 18 2017.

“Both LGBQ sexual identity and traumatic experiences in childhood are linked to a heightened risk of suicidal thoughts and behaviors, U.S. researchers say. Teens who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual or are questioning their sexual identity are also more likely than their heterosexual peers to have had adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) in childhood, the study team reports in Journal of Adolescent Health...'Furthermore, cumulative exposure to ACEs greatly increased suicide risk behaviors among sexual minority adolescents. For example, compared with heterosexual students with no exposure to ACEs, LGB/not sure students with two or more ACEs had approximately 13 times higher odds of attempting suicide in the past year,' Clements-Nolle said. ”

Health Care System Fails Many Transgender Americans, by Neda Ulaby, NPR, Nov 21 2017.

“Preventable problems, including HIV infection and some cancers, kill many people in this community. It's harder for transgender people to find health care coverage, because it's harder for them to find jobs. Social stigmas aside, consider the difficulty of getting hired if your gender does not appear to match the one on your legal ID. According to the 2015 U.S. Transgender Study, transgender people face an unemployment rate three times as high as the national average — 15 percent versus 5 percent...'Right now, it's very hard for a lot of people to even find a primary care provider who's willing to work with them,' said Kellan Baker, a doctoral candidate at Johns Hopkins University who studies how health policies affect gay, lesbian, queer and transgender Americans. He said even if you regularly see a physician, a number of insurance companies will not cover care related to gender transition, such as hormones or surgery. 'Which, as you can imagine, is a huge barrier for transgender people in terms of mental health,' he said. 'So you're looking at yourself in the mirror, you're not able to get health insurance coverage [and] you can't get health care that you need to make sure that how you look aligns with who you are.' ”

Increased Risk for Suicidal Thoughts Among Transgender Students, by Rick Nauert, PhD, Psych Central, Sep 6 2017.

“Emerging evidence suggests school-based mental health services are urgently needed to protect against suicidal thoughts among transgender students...Nearly 35 percent of transgender youth in California reported suicidal thoughts in the past year, compared to 19 percent among non-transgender youth...The study also reports that higher rates of depression and victimization among transgender youth compared to non-transgender youth partly explain higher risk of suicidal thoughts among transgender students...Study authors explain that this research is only a beginning as the results may represent an underestimate of the gender identity-related disparity in suicidal thoughts.  ”

Born this way? Researchers explore the science of gender identity, by Daniel Trotta, Reuters, Aug 3 2017.

“A consortium of five research institutions in Europe and the United States, including Vanderbilt University Medical Center, George Washington University and Boston Children's Hospital, is looking to the genome, a person's complete set of DNA, for clues about whether transgender people are born that way. Two decades of brain research have provided hints of a biological origin to being transgender, but no irrefutable conclusions.  Now scientists in the consortium have embarked on what they call the largest-ever study of its kind, searching for a genetic component to explain why people assigned one gender at birth so persistently identify as the other, often from very early childhood. ”