Child Development: Research & Practice Case Study 2022

Running head: CHILD DEVELOPMENT: RESEARCH & PRACTICE
CHILD DEVELOPMENT: RESEARCH & PRACTICE
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CHILD DEVELOPMENT: RESEARCH & PRACTICE1
Introduction
An increase in numbers of gender non-conforming children is being referred for care,
especially primary care specialists. As stated by the term, gender non-conformity or gender
variance is a behavior or expression exhibited by a person that does not correlate with
masculine or feminine norms of gender. Thus, variance in behavior can be seen as a result;
they are known as gender diverse, gender variant, gender-atypical, or gender non-
conforming. In the case of transgender individuals, they can be perceived as gender
nonconforming prior to transition. Some intersex people also exhibit gender variance.
Rodgers & O’Connor (2017) opined that gender identity is a concept that states that a person
has a personal sense of one’s gender, and thus, it may not be related to the assigned sex at the
time of birth. Each society has a set of categories for gender distinction that supports serving
a framework of self-identity of a person with respect to others in society. However, it is not
similar to an individual’s gender’s role that is apprehensive to a set of behavioral actions and
attitudes that is typical for a particular sex. The aim of the essay is to critically provide an
overview of various researches conducted on the topic, gender nonconforming along with
generalization that includes four reasons for generalizing the analysis with proper
justification.
Critical Review
One of the significant aspects of child development is a transition phase where it
understands that there are differences in various perspectives from other children in the
society. The society runs according to its own set of rules and principles, deviation from it
affect the person to a large extent. One of the aspects that are found to have a detrimental
impact on the developing phase of children is gender nonconforming. According to
Broussard and Warner (2019), childhood gender nonconforming is an occurrence among

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children in their prepubescent phase that do not conform according to the expected gender-
related psychological or sociological attitudes; thus, identifies with the opposite gender.
Several studies confirm the phenomena of childhood gender-nonconforming that related to
homosexuality and identifies the person either as lesbian or gay. According to one of the
studies conducted by Rogers and Meltzoff (2017), the role of non-conformity on the attitudes
towards transgender people was evaluated. Three studies were conducted were transgender or
cisgender were targeted for understanding the distinction between men and women. This was
found that the transgender targets were threatened than cisgender. There were moderate
effects of the belief of gender role and biological gender essentialism that confirmed that
there is a binary role of gender associated with gender expression. In addition to this, the
perception of the prejudice of anti-transgender, there is a decrease in liking that increase the
threat level for transgender as well as gender nonconforming individuals. From the study, it
can be stated that the adult is suffering from discrimination and even threatened to a large
extent. Thus, it is evident that children suffer from the more traumatic situation because of
multiple reasons in the community. From a study conducted by Reilly et al., (2019), a
growing body of awareness, as well as exposure have been found in the media and medical
community that address the complexity of individuals that are gender nonconforming in
nature. It can be seen that despite various studies and publications in important journals
related to child and teen with gender dysphoria and transgender, there is less support to these
people that question gender identity. The study outlines the biological and cognitive bases
with respect to the development of gender identity. According to the American Psychiatric
Association, gender dysphoria is a different situation between an individual is assigned or
physical gender and the gender the person identified (Psychiatry.org, 2016). These people are
not comfortable with the assigned gender and, thus, are stated to be uncomfortable in their
own body especially, in the developmental stages at puberty or the roles they are assigned to

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act according to the assigned gender. According to de Graaf et al., (2018), the frequency of
gender dysphoria in children is unknown; however, the detail related to the sex ratio of
children that are referred to as gender identity clinic is found. The method used for
conducting the study was the reference to the Gender Identity Development Service from
2000 to 2017. It was found that there is a predominant preference of birth-assigned gender
among boys than girls where the ratio is 1:27:1. The preference among boys is 3 to 9 years
were for girls; it is more ranging from 10 to 12 years. The cohort study indicated that there
was a decrease in referred birth-assigned boys from the period of 2000 to 206 and 2007 to
2017. The limitation of the study includes the scope of the study was restricted, and there was
no connection to the international registry. From the study, it was understood that society
prefers birth-assigned boys rather than birth-assigned girls because of prejudice. The concept
of gender-nonconforming in children is found to have various forms, which reflect various
ways according to which the child can relate to gender. As per the literature, the factors that
can be seen to differentiate between an individual with typical gender and atypical gender are
clothing and grooming preferences, the desire to have a playmate of the opposite sex, and
playing with toys that are most preferred by the opposite sex. An example of such behavior
includes a boy playing with dolls, affirmative behavior to become a member of other sex. The
children are found to identify characters of the opposite in various media and a robust verbal
pronouncement of having a cross-gender identity. In another study conducted by Temple
Newhook et al. (2018) had suggested that more than 80% of transgender children have been
identified as cisgender in the developmental phases. The percentage is high because this
phase is stated to be temporary in nature. The use of critical review methodology was
employed that analytically assessed the four studies in order to evaluate the result of gender-
nonconforming children, which is also known as desistance research. From the result, it can
be stated that theoretical, methodological, interpretive, and ethical issues regarding these