Minority stressors and their associations with severe psychological distress among gender-diverse people.

Abstract

People whose gender does not align with assigned sex often experience negative mental health outcomes related to cisnormative societal expectations and oppression, including familial rejection, threat of harm, and identity invalidation (e.g., misgendering). This study merged two crosssectional data sets of trans and gender-diverse people (N = 363; M age = 22.02) investigating how various types of distal minority stress experiences impact psychological distress. We tested the associations between three minority stressors (i.e., family rejection, threat of harm, and identity invalidation) and psychological distress using unadjusted and adjusted regression models, including gender-stratified models. In the overall unadjusted model, all three stressors were significantly, positively associated with psychological distress, with identity invalidation having the highest standardized β value. In the adjusted overall model, only identity invalidation was significantly associated with distress. Results varied in gender-stratified models. Additionally, participants who experienced any of the three stressors had predicted mean distress scores at or above the cutoff for severe psychological distress, while those who did not fell below that cutoff. Results highlight the differential impact of minority stress experiences on genderdiverse young adults and provide directions for clinical competency, interventions, and future research toward understanding mental health disparities for trans people. Public Policy Relevance StatementInvalidating the identity of gender-diverse (e.g., transgender, genderqueer, nonbinary) people is strongly associated with clinically notable levels of psychological distress. This study highlights the need for policies that increase inclusion and decrease invalidation of gender-diverse people in systems and society, as well as efforts that educate the public on trans issues to decrease interpersonal forms of harm and invalidation, which have strong potential to negatively impact mental health. aaa G ender-diverse people experience substantial deleterious mental health outcomes in the United States (U.S.), including anxiety, depression, general psychological distress, and suicidality (

Stressful life events in electronic health records: a scoping review

“…In November 2023 we conducted an additional search to include stressful events for minority populations. This search was conducted using a list of minority stressors compiled from a range of publications [28,[30][31][32][33] (Supplementary Appendix S4).…”

Queer on TV: Using the minority stress model to explore the role of LGBQ+ television exposure in LGBQ+ audiences’ psychological well-being and identity status.

“…A summative score was used as a composite to represent distal minority stress lifetime experiences (α = .88, M = 10.87, SD = 5.63). Although the scale was originally validated using a sample of self-identified lesbian, gay, bisexual, and pansexual adolescents (14–17 years old), it has since been validated among trans and gender-diverse young adults ( M age = 22.02; Pease et al, 2022) and among LGBTQ+ young adults ( M age = 22.10; Shrader et al, 2024).…”

Mattering, wellness, and fairness: Psychosocial goods for the common good.

“…At the community level, when gender-diverse people are exposed to minority stressors related to discrimination, their level of psychological distress goes up considerably (Pease et al, 2022). This is in part due to the lack of fairness they experience in society.…”