Improvement in Gender and Transgender Knowledge in University Students Through the Creative Factory Methodology

Abstract

In Spain, Social Educators, similar to both social workers and educators in the United States, help coordinate social change through educational interventions and mobilization of social groups to benefit marginalized people and overall societal welfare. They are trained to work with diverse populations, and it is important that they have awareness and training on gender and transgender issues given the extensive discrimination that transgender people endue. Research has begun to identify the important role that knowledge and attitudes of health and educational professionals may play in providing a supportive, healing context to combat the harmful effects of this discrimination and how educational trainings may foster improved knowledge and attitudes in helping professions. This study describes a program to improve knowledge and positive attitudes toward gender and especially transgender people in university students who study Social Education. The researchers measured knowledge and attitudes toward gender and transgender people issues of 64 students before and after receiving a 4-month interactive training. They used the Short Form of the Genderism and Transphobia Scale, a 12-item scale of transphobia and gender ideology variables. The researchers also asked participants about their knowledge of gender and transgender issues before and after training. The methodological experience "Creative Factory" was employed as an interactive training program. The main goal of this methodology is to enable students in a formative context to analyze social realities to generate discussion and innovate ideas to design successful practices. After 4 months of training with a weekly session on gender and transgender learning, students showed improvements in knowledge and attitudes toward both gender and transgender people. Specifically, students demonstrated more knowledge about gender and transgender issues and more positive attitudes toward transgender people. The study demonstrates that training in gender education using the Creative Factory methodology improved knowledge and attitudes in students.

English Validation of a Short Scale Designed to Detect Negative Attitudes towards Trans People (EANT)

“…Other studies in Sweden, such as those of Landén and Innala [48], analysed the opinions of 668 persons drawn from the general population, focusing on the reassignment of sex and the rights of this group. Although in this study they found a majority were supportive of the rights of trans people, the least support was expressed for the payment of health care costs during sex-transition (with 63% opposed) and the right of transgender people to adopt and raise children (with 41% opposed) [43]. The limitation of this study was that an integrated instrument was not developed, because the constructs were evaluated separately reducing the capability to draw causal attributions.…”

“…As verified by the educational level of the family members, low training is also closely related to negative attitudes towards trans people. This indicates the importance of detecting negative attitudes in other areas such as in the family, at work or in the community in general [43,44]. Therefore, the understanding and detection of these attitudes is crucial to generating interventions appropriate to the context and to promoting gender formations that include trans people in all areas and initiating the change in the education sector that will allow the transfer to the rest of the environments [43].…”

“…This indicates the importance of detecting negative attitudes in other areas such as in the family, at work or in the community in general [43,44]. Therefore, the understanding and detection of these attitudes is crucial to generating interventions appropriate to the context and to promoting gender formations that include trans people in all areas and initiating the change in the education sector that will allow the transfer to the rest of the environments [43]. Despite the fact that social networks and citizen predisposition is positive, the theoretical productions that can describe and explain negative attitudes towards trans people remain scarce and the approaches are inconsistent [73].…”

“…Universities do not have sufficient means to overcome on their own the stigmatisation and marginalisation of trans people because cisnormative social norms continue and wider contextualising social change is lacking. However, LGBTIQ+ student associations are improving the quality and representation of these learners on campus, but academic changes that take into account the experiences of trans people continue to occur unevenly in university studies and they are mainly in areas of knowledge related to literature, audio-visual media, plastic arts, advertising, education and health [43]. This situation makes trans people opt for training spaces that are perceived to be safer and more respectful, choosing feminised careers such as education and nursing and studies related to art and humanities.…”

An Analysis of LGBTQIA+ University Students’ Perceptions about Sexual and Gender Diversity

“…A survey was designed to be as unbiassed as possible, recognizing the logistical limitations throughout the process, the results present convincing tendencies and suggestions that should be considered when developing strategies that affect the experiences of LGBTQIA+ students [47].…”