A Two-Question Method for Assessing Gender Categories in the Social and Medical Sciences

Three studies (N = 990) assessed the statistical reliability of two methods of determining gender identity that can capture transgender spectrum identities (i.e., current gender identities different from birth-assigned gender categories). Study 1 evaluated a single question with four response options (female, male, transgender, other) on university students. The missing data rate was higher than the valid response rates for transgender and other options using this method. Study 2 evaluated a method of asking two separate questions (i.e., one for current identity and another for birth-assigned category), with response options specific to each. Results showed no missing data and two times the transgender spectrum response rate compared to Study 1. Study 3 showed that the two-question method also worked in community samples, producing near-zero missing data. The two-question method also identified cisgender identities (same birth-assigned and current gender identity), making it a dynamic and desirable measurement tool for the social and medical sciences.     

Foreclosing Fluidity at the Intersection of Gender and Sexual Normativities

Binary gender and sexuality are socially constructed, but they structure thought at such a deep level that even those critical of sexism and homophobia can unwittingly reproduce them, with consequences felt most profoundly by those whose gender/sexual identity defy binary logic. This article outlines a generic pattern in the reproduction of inequality we call foreclosing fluidity, the symbolic or material removal of fluid possibilities from sexual and gender experience and categorization. Based on 115 responses from people who are both sexually and gender fluid and a reading of existing sociologies of gender and sexualities from a fluid standpoint, we demonstrate how lesbian/gay/straight, cisgender, and transgender women and men—regardless of intentions—may foreclose fluidity by mobilizing cisnormative, transnormative, heteronormative, and/or homonormative beliefs and practices. Examining patterns of foreclosing fluidity may provide insight into (1) the further incorporation of fluid people and standpoints into symbolic interactionism, and (2) the reproduction and persistence of sexual and gender inequalities.     

Market Earnings and Household Work: New Tests of Gender Performance Theory

I examine the contested finding that men and women engage in gender performance through housework. Prior scholarship has found a curvilinear association between earnings share and housework that has been interpreted as evidence of gender performance. I reexamine these findings by conducting the first such analysis to use high‐quality time diary data for a U.S. sample in the contemporary period. Drawing on data on 11,868 married women and 10,770 married men in the American Time Use Survey (2003–2007), I find no evidence that married men “do gender” through housework. I do, however, find strong evidence of gender performance among women as evidenced by a curvilinear association between earnings share and women's housework time.     

Associations of Bisexual-Specific Minority Stress and Health Among Cisgender and Transgender Adults with Bisexual Orientation

Among sexual minorities, bisexuals are at the greatest risk for poor health due in part to prejudice and stigma. This research examined associations of bisexual-specific minority stress and health among cisgender (non-transgender) and transgender adults with bisexual orientation. Participants were 488 adults (378 cisgender women, 49 cisgender men, 61 transgender individuals), age 18 to 66 years, with bisexual orientation based on identity and/or attractions to multiple genders. Participants completed an online survey. Hierarchical linear regression analyses were conducted with sexual minority stress and bisexual-specific minority stress as the predictors and physical health, measured by the 36-Item Short Form Survey (SF-36), as the outcome. Models controlled for demographic variables. Moderation analyses were conducted to test for gender differences. Greater bisexual-specific minority stress significantly predicted poorer overall physical health (β = ?0.16), greater pain (β = ?0.16), and poorer general health (β = ?0.25) above and beyond the effects of sexual minority stress. Gender moderated the association between bisexual-specific minority stress and health, such that bisexual-specific minority stress predicted overall physical health and role limitations for transgender individuals but not for cisgender women. Addressing bisexual-specific minority stress is necessary to improve the health and well-being of bisexual individuals.     

Bathrooms,Boundaries, and Emotional Burdens: Cisgendering Interactions Through the Interpretation of Transgender Experience

Building on findings demonstrating that social institutions may cisgender realities by creating and enforcing binary notions of gender rooted in cisgender experience, this study examines the ways cisgender people reinforce cisnormative gender binaries in their ongoing interactions. Utilizing interviews with 99 cisgender people, I show how respondents react to a vignette about a gender nonconforming person seeking to use a public bathroom by “cisgendering interactions,” which I define as the process whereby people reassert binary understandings of gender to make sense of transgender experience while placing an unequal emotional burden on transgender and gender nonconforming people to mend the interactional disruption of the gender panic. Additionally, my analysis extends transgender scholarship by demonstrating some ways cisgender people make sense of transgender people in public spaces. In conclusion, I draw out insights for understanding (1) the ways people cisgender their realities in the face of conflicting stimuli, (2) the ways in which emotions are a mechanism of inequality reproduction, and (3) the consequences these actions have for the perpetuation of gender inequality.     

Gender Labor,Assimilationism, and Transformative Practices: The Relational Negotiations of Cisgender Women and their Transgender Men Partners

Despite the rise in research on the experiences of transgender men (female‐to‐male, FTM) in recent years, little academic attention has been paid to the partners of these individuals. The experiences of a large portion of this population, cisgender women whose partners transition from female to male, provide a unique perspective on how individuals negotiate performances of normative gender ideals and heteronormative practices in transitioning non‐normative relationships. Research has shown that when these cisgender women find themselves in relationships that are socially defined as heterosexual, they often begin questioning their sexual orientation in relation to their partner's gender identity as well as the role and applicability of their beliefs regarding gender equality and anti‐heteronormative practices. This article provides an overview of the current literature that addresses the enactment of gender labor, the practice of reaffirming another person's gender through physical, emotional, and sexual care, by cisgender women whose partners transition from female to male. Specific focus is given to how, in some situations, the performance of gender labor manifests in assimilationist ways that adhere to typically heteronormative frameworks as well as how, in others, the performance of gender labor manifests in potentially transformative and destabilizing ways that serve to challenge normative structures. Gaps in the existing literature as well as directions for future research are also explored.     

Gender Minority Social Stress in Adolescence: Disparities in Adolescent Bullying and Substance Use by Gender Identity

Bullying and substance use represent serious public health issues facing adolescents in the United States. Few large-sample national studies have examined differences in these indicators by gender identity. The Teen Health and Technology Study (N = 5,542) sampled adolescents ages 13 to 18 years old online. Weighted multivariable logistic regression models investigated disparities in substance use and tested a gender minority social stress hypothesis, comparing gender minority youth (i.e., who are transgender/gender nonconforming and have a gender different from their sex assigned at birth) and cisgender (i.e., whose gender identity or expression matches theirs assigned at birth). Overall, 11.5% of youth self-identified as gender minority. Gender minority youth had increased odds of past-12-month alcohol use, marijuana use, and nonmarijuana illicit drug use. Gender minority youth disproportionately experienced bullying and harassment in the past 12 months, and this victimization was associated with increased odds of all substance use indicators. Bullying mediated the elevated odds of substance use for gender minority youth compared to cisgender adolescents. Findings support the use of gender minority stress perspectives in designing early interventions aimed at addressing the negative health sequelae of bullying and harassment.     

Do Workplace Gender Transitions Make Gender Trouble?

This article examines what happens when an employee makes the transition from one recognized gender category to another and remains in the same job. Drawing on in‐depth interviews with transmen and transwomen in Texas and California, we illustrate how a new social gender identity is interactionally achieved in these open workplace transitions. While transgender people often are represented as purposefully adopting hyper‐feminine or masculine gender identities post‐transition, we find that our respondents strive to craft alternative femininities and masculinities. However, regardless of their personal gender ideologies, their men and women co‐workers often enlist their transitioning colleague into gender rituals designed to repatriate them into a rigid gender binary. This enlistment limits the political possibilities of making gender trouble in the workplace, as transgender people have little leeway for resistance if they wish to maintain job security and friendly workplace relationships.     

Untangling Inequalities: Gender,Race, and Socioeconomic Differences in Depression1

In their important paper, Link and Phelan (1995) argue that socioeconomic status is a fundamental cause of variation in well‐being and that the social resources associated with socioeconomic status constitute the fundamental cause of variation in well‐being. In this article, I elaborate on the fundamental cause perspective in three respects: by suggesting an expansion of the definition of resources, by examining how race and gender influence variation in the relationship between resources and mental health, and by developing a model of the relationship between social class, race, and gender that takes account of the potential asymmetry in the influence of resources across race and gender. Using the 2003 National Health Interview Survey and ordinary least squares regression, I find that black and white men are significantly less depressed than black and white women. However, women accrue greater mental health advantage from marriage, home ownership, and education. African‐American men experience less depression as a result of being unmarried and non‐Hispanic white women experience less benefit from full‐time employment, relative to African‐American women and men. Results are discussed in terms of implications for future research on race, class, and gender differences in health.     

Cisgendered Organizations: Trans Women and Inequality in the Workplace

This article responds to calls to better understand how intersecting “inequality regimes” operate in organizations. Through in‐depth interviews with 25 white trans women about their workplace experiences, my analyses highlight how trans women navigate relational practices that are simultaneously gendered and cisgendered—that is, practices that maintain cultural connections between sex and gender and maintain gender as immutable. Findings demarcate three distinct mechanisms by which cisgenderism, a system that devalues women and trans people, operates and strengthens hierarchical privileges at work: (1) double‐bind constraints; (2) fluid biases of cissexism and sexism; and (3) group practices of privilege and subordination. In the first regard, analyses reveal unique double binds that trans women face—binds that dictate contradictory feminine and masculine ideal worker expectations but also expectations of gender authenticity. Second, I find that trans women often hover between two subordinate statuses (i.e., gender and transgender status) in a given workday, a fact that prods a more fluid conception of cisgenderism. Finally, this study highlights how cis men collectively mobilize through group practices to repair cisgender system breaches. All three dimensions are critical for understanding the production of workplace inequality between not only trans women and cis men, but all feminine‐identified workers.     

(Trans)Gender Role Expectations and Child Care in Samoa

Samoan transgendered males are known as fa'afafine. Although Samoan women are characterized as the primary child care providers, fa'afafine report elevated willingness to invest in nieces and nephews compared to men and women. We hypothesized that Samoans hold unique transgender role expectations such that fa'afafine are expected to invest more toward nieces and nephews compared to others. Participants (N = 214) included Samoan men (30.23 years ±8.19), women (30.00 years ±10.93), and fa'afafine (30.25 years ±7.45). For a variety of child care activities, participants nominated men, women, fa'afafine, or all three of these categories of individuals as responsible for investing toward nieces and nephews. Participants also reported how frequently their family members asked them to perform these activities for nieces and nephews. Responsibility for performing these activities was typically designated for women; men and women viewed fa'afafine as least responsible. Men's, but not fa'afafine's, family members asked them to allocate investment toward nieces and nephews more frequently. These findings are not consistent with the transgender role expectation hypothesis. Discussion details how the findings contribute to the literature on child care in Samoa. Alternate hypotheses for explaining why fa'afafine report elevated willingness to invest in nieces and nephews are considered.     

Transgender experiences and transphobia in higher education

While categories like “campus climate” highlight variation across institutions, trans people's experiences also vary within an institutional context. By studying trans people's experiences in higher education, however, we can better understand and respond to the differentiated and changing needs of transgender people in other arenas. In this paper, I review key qualitative and quantitative findings along several themes: (a) disclosing trans identities, (b) trans communities, and (c) resources and career‐level support. Specifically, I use the concept of microclimates to explain how trans people encounter various forms of support and discrimination on campus. For example, someone might receive support from particular individuals, such as an advisor, or spaces, like a gender studies classroom, but not others. Researchers also report both similarities and differences between binary and nonbinary trans people, as well as between transgender men and transgender women, suggesting that there is no universal trans experience, nor a one‐size‐fits‐all approach to supporting trans students and faculty members. Challenging interpersonal and systemic transphobia requires context‐specific interventions.     

Practising Gender at Work: Further Thoughts on Reflexivity

In an effort to make visible the subtle and seldom acknowledged aspects of gendering dynamics, Martin focuses on unreflexive practices that both communicate and constitute gender in paid work settings. She reviews the distinction between practices that are culturally available to ‘do gender’ and the literal practising of gender that is constituted through interaction. While acknowledging that agency is involved in any practicing of gender, she considers how intentionality and agency intersect, arguing that people in powerful positions routinely practise gender without being reflexive about it. Defining practising as emergent, directional, temporal, rapid, immediate and indeterminate, Martin shows how these qualities affect men as well as women in unexpected and often harmful ways. She concludes with a call for innovative ways to ‘catch gender in practice’ and for attention to reflexivity's role in the ongoing constitution of gender at work.     

“Women's Work”? Women Partners of Transgender Men Doing Housework and Emotion Work

Despite increasing family studies research on same‐sex cohabiters and families, the literature is virtually devoid of transgender and transsexual families. To bridge this gap, I present qualitative research narratives on household labor and emotion work from 50 women partners of transgender and transsexual men. Contrary to much literature on “same‐sex” couples, the division of household labor and emotion work within these contemporary families cannot simply be described as egalitarian. Further, although the forms of emotion work and “gender strategies,”“family myths,” and “accounts” with which women partners of trans men engage resonate with those from women in (non‐trans) heterosexual and lesbian couples, they are also distinct, highlighting tensions among personal agency, politics, and structural inequalities in family life.     

Intentional Families: Fictive Kin Ties Between Cross‐Gender,Different Sexual Orientation Friends

This study explores the nature of intentional family relationships between friends of different genders and different sexual orientations. Drawing on in‐depth interviews with 46 members of 23 friendship dyads, I first make the case that the friends considered one another family and I specify the criteria they use for making such designations. I then focus on the ways in which gender and sexual orientation influenced relationships between lesbians and straight men and between gay men and straight women. The data provided evidence that the dyad members identified one another as family and served the functions of family for each other. The findings also suggest that various gender issues affect cross‐gender, different sexual orientation relationships. Exploring the meaning and functioning of these intentional family ties documents their existence and illuminates their meaning and maintenance.     

Missing from the Conversation: Sexual Risk Factors Across Young People by Gender Identity and Sexual Orientation

Abstract

Objectives: Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and queer/questioning (LGBQ), and transgender/nonbinary (trans/NB) youth experience health disparities. Much research combines gender identity with sexual orientation or siloes them, ignoring intersections. Methods: Logistic regressions with representative data from 2015 Healthy Kids Colorado Survey (n?=?15,970) explores sexual risk. Results: Findings indicate LGBQ and trans/NB youth have differential levels of sexual risk (drugs during sexual interactions, not using condoms) compared to cisgender heterosexual peers. Other identities, mental health, and bullying are also related. Conclusions: There is a need for culturally responsive bullying prevention, mental health support, education, and sexual health services for marginalized populations.     

Moderating masculinity in women-dominated digital spaces: Men and masculinity in the sims 4 online community

This article examines gender dynamics within a women-dominated online community centered around The Sims, a feminine-coded simulation computer game in which women are the majority of players. Based on qualitative analysis of 10 threads and approximately 400 comments from both the official Sims 4 forums and unofficial Sims 4 subreddit, as well as online ethnography, I find that some men responded to their minority status within the Sims community by arguing that men were neglected by the developers at the expensive the inclusion of women and LGBTQ players, for instance, due to an imbalance of content designed for men versus women. However, these men experienced pushback against these ideas in such a way that minimized their voices. I argue that this pushback is a form of moderating masculinity to defend the safety of the community for women. This study contributes to our understanding of gender dynamics in digital spaces, particularly those dominated by women.     

The Gender Gap in Attitudes About Childlessness in the United States

Acceptance of childlessness has increased since the 1970s, with women reporting greater acceptance than men. Using the National Survey of Families and Households (1987 – 1988; N = 10,648) and the General Social Survey (1994; N =1,395), we examined this gender gap as it relates to both structural and sociocultural factors, including religion, gender attitudes, and other attitudes about gender and family. Women were more likely than men to hold positive attitudes about childlessness, and women’s less traditional attitudes about marriage, gender equality, and women’s employment only partially explained this difference. In the childbearing ages, positive attitudes were strongly related to intentions to remain childless and showed a greater gender gap at higher education levels. The findings highlight important differences in men’s and women’s experiences of family, work, and gender issues.     

Gender,Marital Status and Social Support

Abstract

While many studies have examined the separate effects of gender and marital status on patterns of perceived social support, none have examined the simultaneous effects of these two variables while controlling for other relevant variables in a large, random sample. This paper responds to this lacuna by investigating the relationships among these variables for six specific types of problems that may elicit social support from others. Using data drawn from a representative sample of the United States population, results indicate that the perception of sources of social support is primarily shaped by differences in marital status as opposed to gender. However, gender is influential in some situations. While it is not significantly related to the perception of emotional support, gender is significantly related to the perception of instrumental support. (Women manifest a tendency to consider both spouse / partner and relatives as sources of instrumental support more than men, while men rely on friends as sources of instrumental support.) The suggestion that gender may find expression within categories of marital status is supported by findings indicating that, within each of the marital status categories, when men turn to relatives and / or friends for help they tend to be male and when women turn to relatives and / or friends for help they tend to be female. Suggestions for future research are offered.     

Racial and Ethnic Differences in Experiences of Discrimination in Accessing Social Services Among Transgender/Gender-Nonconforming People

Members of the transgender/gender-nonconforming (GNC) community experience higher rates of discrimination based on their gender compared to their cisgender counterparts. Similarly, people of color experience higher rates of discrimination than White people. This study examines the difference in experiences of discrimination among transgender/GNC individuals in accessing social services providers by race/ethnicity (White and people of color). The data collected in a national cross-sectional survey (N = 6,451) and analyzed via chi-square test of independence and binary logistic regression demonstrate the disproportionate prevalence of discrimination based on race/ethnicity within the transgender/GNC population when accessing social services such as drug treatment centers, mental health clinics, domestic violence shelters, and rape crisis centers. Social workers are the most common provider of social services to the community, and have an ethical commitment to provision of services without discrimination. High rates of discrimination in accessing social services among transgender/GNC people, with even higher rates of discrimination for transgender/GNC people of color, highlight the need for improvement in social work education and practice.