Gender Expression and Its Correlates in a Nationally Representative Sample of the U.S. Adult Population: Findings from the National Survey of Sexual Health and Behavior

ABSTRACT

We explored the associations of gender expression with childhood gender expression, sexual identity, and demographic characteristics in a representative sample of the U.S. population aged 18 to 65 years (N = 1277), using data from the 2015 National Survey of Sexual Health and Behavior. As expected, gay men were less gender conforming than heterosexual men. However, among women, persons with a bisexual identity were less gender conforming compared to heterosexual and lesbian persons. In multivariate analyses, childhood gender expression trumped the role of sexual identity. In terms of demographic characteristics, gender conformity seemed to be more present among persons with positions with less social status in terms of age, race/ethnicity, education, income, and relationship status. Finally, we found among both men and women, that a large proportion saw themselves as more masculine or feminine than men and women on average, respectively, suggesting that accentuating one’s gender conformity has a psychological function.

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Disclosure Statement

The authors had no financial interest or benefit that has arisen from the direct applications of the research.

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Funding

Funding for the National Survey of Sexual Health & Behavior (NSSHB) is provided by Church & Dwight, Co., Inc. (Debby Herbenick and Michael Reece, Principal Investigators). Additional funding for data collection using the gender expression items was awarded by Indiana University School of Public Health-Bloomington (Brian Dodge, Principal Investigator). Dr. Sandfort’s contribution to this manuscript was supported by a National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) center grant (P30-MH43520; PI: Robert Remien, PhD) to the HIV Center for Clinical and Behavioral Research. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.