By Sheri, aka Zoom Goddess
The American Psychological Association has a long and troubled history with the queer and gender diverse community. For many years, it accepted the American Psychiatric Association’s classification of homosexuality as a mental health disorder. It also drives academic research on sexual orientation and gender diversity. In the past year, the APA published two tools that will help us move forward toward equity for queer and gender diverse people:
Following an iterative multi-community-driven process and extensive validation, the Gender Self-Report was released in American Psychologist 2023, (Vol 78, no 7, 886-900) https://doi.org/10.1037/amp000111.This is the first multidimensional gender characterization tool, accessible to youth and adults, neurotypical and neurodivergent people, and gender-diverse and cisgender individuals. This 30-question self-report measure is accessible to folks with or without access to sophisticated gender terminology.
Psychology of Sexual Orientation and Gender Diversity2024 (Vol 11, no 3, 365-396) https://doi.org/10.1037/sgd0000722. released a thoughtful and reflective guide for how to conduct and write about research on sexual orientation and gender diversity.
These two publications represent amazing strides forward in how queer, gender diverse and neurodiverse folks can be recognized and counted. The guide is not light weekend reading, but the questionnaire is worth a look.
Sheri (she/her) lives in Seattle, WA, U.S., with her life-partner Tim. She loves to spend time in her garden and hanging out with the crows, Stellar’s jays, and Anna’s hummingbirds on her back deck. She supports the BWQ community as Zoom Goddess, organizing our monthly “digital brunches.” She has been a member of the American Psychological Association for over two decades.