An Affirmative Intervention for Families with Gender-Variant Children: A Process Evaluation

Abstract

This is a report on a program for parents who have children who exhibit gender-variant behaviors and who contacted an affirmative program in the United States for assistance. All parents completed semi-structured telephone interviews. The data analysis proceeded in two phases, first as a grounded-theory analysis for themes that emerged from the data, and second as an examination of the data in light of the psychology of social exclusion. The results support the contention that parents who develop a supportive stance about their child's gender variance are diverse in their concerns and may or may not start from a position of rejection and attempts at normalization. In order to arrive to acceptance, parents go through a process of reassessment of previously held attitudes or beliefs, and this process is varied. Regardless of initial attitudes, most parents reported significant benefits, both to their self and their child, from their involvement with the program.

KEYWORDS:

• gender identity disorder
• treatment
• evaluation
• child
• adolescent

The second author would like to acknowledge financial support from a Professional Staff Congress-City University of New York research grant and research support from Kristin M. Sica and Alisa Johnson.