Publications - Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity

LGBTQ People With Developmental Disabilities Need Respect, Privacy, and Access to Community, by Jennifer Smith, Jun 22 2017.

“Forging healthy relationships often depends on the availability and willingness of supportive staff to facilitate such interactions. But the direct support profession is in peril, facing high turnover, low wages, limited training, and ineffective supervision, according to the American Association on Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities. The AAIDD has called for more professional development opportunities so direct support professionals can handle their increasing responsibilities. As direct support professionals are thrown into more autonomous roles without proper supervision or training, they may be unwilling to tackle touchy subjects like sexuality and gender identity ”

Emergency doc training important to improving transgender care, by Andrew M. Seaman, Reuters, Mar 1 2017.

“The negative experiences of transgender and gender nonconforming patients in U.S. emergency departments could be avoided with better training for doctors, suggests a new study.  Based on survey responses from 240 transgender and gender nonconforming people, researchers say negative experiences were often attributable to doctors' lack of knowledge. ”

The Tale Of Two Princes, by Joshua Desjardins (Author) and Michael Hetrick (Illustrator) , 2017.

2016 deadliest year on record for U.S. transgender people, campaigners say, by Sebastien Malo, Reuters, Nov 10 2016.

“Murders of transgender people hit an all-time high in the United States this year, campaigners said on Thursday, amid fears of a backlash against the transgender community following the election of Donald Trump as the next U.S. president.  GLAAD, a U.S. advocacy group that tracks transgender murders said 24 transgender people were murdered, exceeding last year's tally of 22. Most of this year's victims were women of colour, GLAAD said. ”

Trans And Adopted: Exploring Teen Identity, by Martha Bebinger, Kaiser Health News, Sep 1 2016.

“Doctors at Boston Children’s Hospital’s Gender Management Service clinic, where Nathan is a patient, began making the same connection a few years ago. They combed through patient records and found that 8.2 percent of the 184 young people seen in the clinic between 2007 and 2015 were raised in adoptive families. Overall, only 2.3 percent of children living in Massachusetts were adopted. “Before I started seeing transgender kids, it would not have occurred to me that we might see more adopted kids,” said Dr. Daniel Shumer, a pediatric endocrinologist who treated transgender kids at the GeMS clinic for three years before moving to Ann Arbor, Mich., to work in a similar clinic. ”

Study: Same-sex experiences are on the rise, and Americans are increasingly chill about it, by Rachel Feltman, The Washington Post, Jun 1 2016.

“A rise in bisexuality is driving a sharp increase in same-sex experiences in the United States, according to a new study — and Americans are increasingly open to the shift. Using data from the General Social Survey (GSS), a nationally representative survey of U.S. adults conducted since 1972 including a total of 33,728 participants, a team of social scientists found that the percentage of men reporting male sexual partners had nearly doubled from 1990 to 2014, and the percentage of women reporting same-sex experiences had more than doubled during the same period. Their study, published Wednesday in the journal Archives of Sexual Behavior, also shows a dramatic increase in the percentage of Americans who find these sexual interactions acceptable. ”

For trans people, family rejection tied to suicide attempts, substance abuse, by Andrew M. Seaman, Reuters, May 27 2016.

“For transgender or gender non-conforming individuals, as rejection from family members increases, so does their likelihood of suicide attempts or substance abuse, according to a new study.   "People should understand that families matter," said researcher Sarit Golub, of Hunter College and the Graduate Center of City University of New York (CUNY). "When people are rejected by their loved ones, it can have serious emotional and social consequences." ”

DOMESTIC VIOLENCE IN THE TRANSGENDER COMMUNITY, by MEGAN DOTTERMUSCH, nomore.org, Apr 29 2016.

“Domestic violence affects all populations, but the transgender community is victimized at higher rates than the general population: according to a review completed by The Williams Institute, 30 percent to 50 percent of transgender people experience intimate partner violence at some point in their lifetime compared to 28 to 33 percent in the general population. ”

Mental health risks aren't equal among all gay, bisexual men, by Andrew M. Seaman, Reuters, Apr 28 2016.

“While gay and bisexual men are at higher risk for mental health issues than their straight counterparts, the risk is particularly high for young gay and bisexual men, a new study has found.   On the other hand, high levels of education, income and living with a man were among the factors that seemed to protect gay and bisexual men of all ages against depression, anxiety and other mental health problems. ”

The Gender Creative Child: Pathways for Nurturing and Supporting Children Who Live Outside Gender Boxes, by Diane Ehrensaft PhD (Author), Norman Spack MD (Foreword) , Apr 5 2016.

Probing The Complexities Of Transgender Mental Health, by Tara Haelle, NPR, Mar 23 2016.

“Experiencing the world as a different gender than the one assigned to you at birth can take a toll. Nearly all research into transgender individuals' mental health shows poorer outcomes. A new study looking specifically at transgender women, predominantly women of color, only further confirms that reality. What's less clear, however, is whether trans individuals experience more mental distress due to external factors, such as discrimination and lack of support, or internal factors, such as gender dysphoria, the tension resulting from having a gender identity that differs from the one assigned at birth. ”

How Our Intolerant Society Contributes to LGBT Mental Disorders, by Neal Broverman, Advocate, Mar 18 2016.

“Study after study shows LGBT Americans suffer from mental health disorders at rates far exceeding heterosexual people — depression strikes gay men at six times the rate of straight men; nearly half of transgender people encounter symptoms of anxiety and depression; lesbians and bisexual women also deal with higher rates of mental health struggles than their straight sisters, with bisexual women faring even worse than lesbians. LGB youth are four times more likely, and questioning youth three times more likely, to attempt suicide as their straight peers; 41 percent of transgender people have attempted to end their lives. Health professionals see a direct parallel between these findings and government-backed prejudice. ”

Transgender U.S. veterans suffer more illness than peers: study, by Sebastien Malo, Reuters, Jan 7 2016.

“Transgender U.S. military veterans are more prone to dozens of illnesses, from heart disease to depression and obesity, than are their nontransgender peers, a new study shows. An estimated 134,000 people are transgender veterans, experts estimate, more susceptible to mental conditions including post-traumatic stress disorder, alcohol abuse and suicide, the study said. ”

US transgender people solemnly mark a deadly year , by Marisa Taylor, Aljazeera America, Nov 20 2015.

“Anti-transgender violence has killed at least 21 people across the United States in 2015, according to rights activists who gathered on Friday to mark Transgender Day of Remembrance, in which the trans community honors it members killed in acts of violence. ”

The Challenge of Being Transgender in a Nursing Home, by Mo Perry, The Atlantic , Aug 12 2015.

“Currently, there are more than 1.5 million LGBT people over 65 in the U.S., a number expected to double over the next 15 years as the population ages. But precise statistics on older transgender adults-or, for that matter, transgender people of any age-are hard to come by. One 2011 study using health-survey data estimated that the country’s transgender population was around 700,000; this past May, the Census Bureau published a study that analyzed the number of “likely transgender individuals” based on the people who had changed their name (around 90,000) or sex (around 22,000) with the Social Security Administration. These estimates vary so wildly in part because there’s no reliable means of tracking when people change their gender: The Census Bureau still offers only male and female, and many trans people haven’t completely transitioned into living full-time as their expressed gender. Others have so successfully suppressed their history that there’s little evidence they ever lived as anyone else. One thing, though, is clear: For transgender people, aging into the later years of life can present a unique set of challenges. ”