Transgender and gender diverse adults' self-reported mental health diagnoses, engagement in mental health services, and perceptions of therapists.

OBJECTIVE: Transgender and gender diverse (TGD) people face various challenges when seeking therapy. Given this, we wanted to understand more about TGD people's perceptions of providers and how these compare to researcher ratings of providers on metrics of affirming practice. METHOD: The sample included 158 TGD adults (Mage = 33.06); 57.6% were in therapy. Participants completed measures about mental health, resilience, and therapy. We systematically coded provider websites and intake forms. RESULTS: Participants in therapy were older, had higher depression, and lower resilience than participants not in therapy. Non-binary/genderqueer participants rated providers as less knowledgeable compared to trans feminine participants. Overall, participants appeared satisfied (71.4% extremely satisfied) and viewed providers as at least moderately knowledgeable (89.1%). Provider coding revealed variation across the markers of affirmation; 66.04% identified a TGD-specialty and only 26.42% shared provider pronouns. Higher frequency of inclusivity (via coding) was related to higher ratings of provider knowledge and more of a focus on gender, however, there was not a significant association with satisfaction. CONCLUSIONS: Providers who engaged in more affirming practices were more knowledgeable compared to those who engaged in fewer affirming practices. This may influence the content of therapy and whether clients feel comfortable discussing gender.

The Association between Social Dominance Orientation, Critical Consciousness, and Gender Minority Stigma.

Transgender people are exposed to great amounts of discrimination and violence, but research has yet to fully understand what drives stigma towards this community. In this study, we hypothesized that social dominance orientation would be associated with greater gender minority stigma (i.e., stigmatizing views of transgender people), with this association mediated by higher levels of trait aggression and lower levels of critical consciousness. Data were collected online from 254 cisgender individuals (158 women, 96 men; M age = 30.81 years). Social dominance orientation was associated with higher levels of gender minority stigma. Trait aggression was not a significant mediator of this association. However, there was a significant indirect effect via lowered critical consciousness (B = 0.10, SE = 0.04, 95% CI: 0.02, 0.17). Approaches that increase awareness about social hierarchies and systems of privilege will likely prove fruitful in facilitating social change in attitudes towards transgender people.