Sorry, this project has finished.

Please contact 2262535h@student.gla.ac.uk with any questions about this study.

The study is now closed. Thank you for your interest.

This study investigated (1) how people with both binary and non-binary gender identities respond to four different ways (binary; binary + other; extended list; open-ended response) in which gender is commonly assessed in surveys and (2) how represented they feel by the options those four ways provide.

I will be posting a summary of the results at https://osf.io/9vsqf/ once I complete my dissertation.

I hypothesise (1) that participants with non-binary genders will be split between selecting the gender closest to their gender and skipping the questions that did not include their gender as a response option. (2) Participants’ with binary gender identities response rates will not differ between the different assessment options. (3) Participants with binary gender identities will feel strongly represented in their gender identity by all of the options, while those with non-binary gender identities will feel most represented by the open-ended gender question, followed by the long extended list, and least by the binary (male/female) and short extended list (male/female + ‘other’) option.

These hypotheses will be tested by comparing response rates to the gender items and the ratings of ‘feeling represented’ both between groups (binary and non-binary) and between items within each group. I will also use the responses from the ‘additional comments and thoughts’ question for an explorative qualitative analysis on participants’ views on the way gender is assessed.

A note on language:

Three of the four options were purposefully exclusive of many gender identities as this is (sadly) the format many large surveys still use. The same three assessment options also conflated sex (‘male’/’female’) and gender (‘woman’/’man’). This conflation is so ingrained in both coloquial language and research practice that I decided to use it in all three list options since the goal was to mimic surveys participants might encounter. Additionally, the word ‘transgender’ was used despite being an inaccurate description of many transgender identities. I hope that the free response option was able to relieve some of the negative feelings that the other items might have caused.

More information:

I recommend these papers if you would like to read more on the topic:

Gloria Fraser (2018) Evaluating inclusive gender identity measures for use in quantitative psychological research, Psychology & Sexuality, 9:4, 343-357, https://doi.org/10.1080/19419899.2018.1497693

Reisner, S. L., Conron, K. J., Baker, K., Herman, J. L., Lombardi, E., Greytak, E. A., ... & GenIUSS Group. (2015). “Counting” transgender and gender-nonconforming adults in health research: recommendations from the Gender Identity in US Surveillance Group. Transgender Studies Quarterly, 2(1), 34-57. https://doi.org/10.1215/23289252-2848877

Westbrook, L., & Saperstein, A. (2015). New Categories Are Not Enough: Rethinking the Measurement of Sex and Gender in Social Surveys. Gender & Society, 29(4), 534–560. https://doi.org/10.1177/0891243215584758

Luisa Hahn (she/her)