Therapists sound alarm after study shows dramatic rise in gender dysphoria among children


Therapists sound alarm after study shows dramatic rise in gender dysphoria among children

Published January 28, 2025 5:00am EST Mental health experts warned social factors could be contributing to the rise in gender dysphoria in children, after a new study found cases have skyrocketed over a ten-year period. Gender dysphoria refers to "the psychological distress that results from an incongruence between one’s sex assigned at birth and one’s gender identity," according to the American Psychiatric Association. The study, published January 24 in the UK medical journal, The Archives of Disease in Childhood, found there was a 50-fold increase in recorded prevalence of gender dysphoria among patients aged 18 or younger in primary care settings in England between 2011 and 2021. The study found incident rates for gender dysphoria rose sharply among female patients after 2015 and were "approximately twice as high" as in males by 2021.