Gender Nonconformity May Increase Mental Health Risks

People who do not conform to gender stereotypes may have an increased risk of depression, anxiety and low self-esteem, new research suggests. The connection was particularly pronounced among young men and teenagers. "Gender nonconformity are behaviors, interests, and dispositions that depart from average expectations about sex typical traits in the population e.g., when boys and men show interest in stereotypically feminine activities on average compared to other boys/men," Qazi Rahman, a senior lecturer at King's College London who led the research, told Newsweek. "It is important to study these behaviors since they could attract bullying, discrimination and victimization from other people and these experiences might then cascade into poorer mental health." In the study, Rahman and his team went through 1,975 published studies looking into the relationship between gender non-conformity and a range of mental health disorders, including anxiety, depression, self-esteem, self-harm and suicidal thoughts. "Gender nonconformity was associated with depression, anxiety, self-esteem, self-harm and suicide attempts in our research; a link that was stronger in men than women," Rahman said. "However, it is important to note that the links were small. Gender nonconformity explained less than 10 percent of the association with these problems." It is also worth remembering that this correlation does not prove that gender nonconformity causes these problems. "This analysis of the existing literature confirms an association between psychopathology and nonconformity between gender and sex at birth," David Curtis, a professor of genetics, evolution and environment at University College London, who was not involved in the research, told Newsweek. "However the data does not allow one to say how much of this association arises from external social pressures as against factors operating within the individual." The authors wrote that these associations suggest that there is a need for more interventions to help mitigate these mental health differences and to improve overall well-being among those who display greater gender nonconformity. "I do think there are things we could do to help individuals cope with the environment and realities that we live in," Rahman said. "Thus, we should think about what interventions might look like that teach coping skills to gender nonconformity or LGBTQ+ people so that can cope with the environments of discrimination/stigma that they encounter." However, Curtis said that the study itself did not provide enough evidence to support these conclusions. "Of course one would want to try to improve well-being for anybody reporting poor mental health, but I do not see that gender nonconformity on its own should be taken as in indication for intervention."

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References

Xu, Y., Feng, J., & Rahman, Q. (2024). Gender nonconformity and common mental health problems: A meta-analysis. Clinical Psychology Review, 114. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cpr.2024.102500