From blues to rainbows: the mental health and well-being of gender diverse and transgender young people in Australia

This study of gender diverse and transgender young people reveals high rates of depression, suicidal thoughts and anxiety. Introduction This report is the culmination of many months of engagement across Australia with young people aged between 14 and 25 who have shared their thoughts, understandings, experiences, hopes and dreams with us through an online survey and online interviews. Their narratives are insightful, touching, and hopeful. Young voices have told us how they care for themselves as well as shining a light on how health services, schools, government and policy makers can better serve their needs. This research was designed to expand on findings from previous Australian research with young people that found that gender-questioning and transgender young people not only experienced higher rates of self-harm and suicidal thoughts, but were also more likely to be involved in activism than their cisgender and same-sex attracted peers. This later finding is a potentially positive one and points to the need for research to not only explore the mental health needs of these young people but also the ways in which they advocate and care for themselves in the face of discrimination and abuse

Writing themselves in: a national report on the sexuality, health and well-being of same-sex attracted young people

This 1998 report is about young people who are attracted to their own sex. The need for accurate baseline figures about young people of non-heterosexual orientation has developed as part of a general concern about the spread of the HIV virus into the adolescent population and a specific concern around these young people’s emotional well-being. In the past three years, Australian adolescent research conducted by the National Centre in HIV Social Research, La Trobe University, has revealed that a significant minority of young people are not unequivocally heterosexual, with numbers ranging between 8 and 11% in recent research. Research which specifically targets this population has, until now, been conducted retrospectively and/or with people who identify as gay or lesbian recruited through gay and lesbian youth groups or the gay press. As researchers we know little about young people at pre-identity or pre-disclosure stages because their need for anonymity means they cannot be contacted through the usual channels. The young people represented in this project were accessed through an advertising campaign in National magazines, via radio and the Internet. A survey was available on a website and from the Centre for the Study of Sexually Transmissible Diseases. Surveys were also inserted in the gay and street press. These surveys sought information regarding sexual feelings and experiences as well as sexual and drug-taking practices in regard to STDs (including HIV) and related diseases. The source and adequacy of sexual health information for this group and their levels of support and experiences of abuse and discrimination were also elicited. The survey also charted young people’s perceptions of their quality of life and emotional well-being. In addition, participants were also asked to write stories about their experiences, including when they first knew about their sexual feelings, their relationships with family and friends, and their hopes for the future. &nbsp

Writing themselves in 3: the third national study on the sexual health and wellbeing of same sex attracted and gender questioning young people

Executive Summary Introduction This is the third of the Writing Themselves In national reports which have been conducted six years apart since 1998. In 2010, a total of 3134 same sex attracted and gender questioning (SSAGQ) young people participated in Writing Themselves In 3 (WTi3), almost double the number in 2004 and more than four times that of 1998. The participants, who were aged between 14 and 21 years, came from all states and territories of Australia, from remote (2%), rural (18%) and urban (67%) areas and from a range of culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) backgrounds. There were more young women (57%) than young men (41%) and a smaller group (3%) who were gender questioning (GQ). Sexual feelings In 2010, the complex interaction of sexual attraction, identity and behaviour was even more evident than in previous studies. Most young men were exclusively same sex attracted but half of the young women were attracted to both sexes and less than one third exclusively to the same sex. More than a third of young people realized their sexual difference before puberty and there were few gender differences in age of first realization. More young people felt positive about their same sex attraction than in 2004. As in 2004, young people who felt bad about their sexuality used homophobic beliefs to describe their reasons whereas those who felt good used resistant, affirming explanations. Sexual identity Most young men identified as gay/homosexual. Young women were more likely to identify as bisexual. Young women chose a greater range of identity terms to describe their sexuality

Homophobia and the production of shame: young people and same sex attraction

Research among same-sex attracted young people in Western cultures has described a minority group of adolescents whose sexuality is negated by the significant institutions and people in their lives. Very often, there is a silence in the family and at school about same-sex sexuality and when a young person\u27s homosexuality is suspected or disclosed s/he suffers from denial, discrimination and abuse. Not surprisingly, living in hostile environments leaves such young people at high-risk of drug abuse, depression and suicide. This paper describes some of the ways young people resist being positioned in these negative ways. Using autobiographical stories from 200 same-sex attracted young Australians, we document the discursive field of sexuality in which these young people struggle to construct positive identities. Young people were well aware of dominant discourses which characterized homosexuality as \u27evil, diseased and unnatural\u27. Yet they use different strategies to fault, deflect and discount these negative understandings and to highlight other discourse which positions them positively. <br /

“Nothing about us without us”: The ideals and realities of participatory action research with people with an intellectual disability

Undertaking participatory research with people with intellectual disabilities is becoming a much-discussed issue. Some researchers and self-advocates argue strongly that only participatory research can produce useful, honest research which assists people with intellectual disabilities to attain their rights. Others question whether such research is possible or indeed desirable. This paper describes a three-year action research project which sought to carry out participatory research on the sensitive issue of sexuality. The research grew partly from concerns of people with intellectual disabilities about this issue and involved them in its management and implementation as well as in developing workshops and publications arising from the research. The research process was consciously self reflective and raised questions about participatory research, representation and difference, and the dialectical relationship between individual life histories and institutional change. This paper discusses these issues and the contribution they make to current methodological debates

Screened Out: Women with Disabilities and Preventive Health

This paper explores the lived experience of women with disabilities in relation to preventative health. It is based on qualitative research in Australia involving 25 individual interviews and 4 focus groups with women with disabilities about their experience of cervical screening (Pap tests), 16 interviews and 2 focus groups with service providers and advocacy organizations and an audit of 4 Pap Test Services by a researcher with a disability. The research identified three kinds of barrier that prevented some women from accessing cervical screening: societal barriers, individual living circumstances, and the way the women and those around them constituted their subjectivity. This paper outlines briefly the key findings from the study, focussing particularly on barriers relating to subjectivity

The impacts of discriminatory experiences on lesbian, gay and bisexual people in sport

This study examines the nature and impact of sexist and homophobic discrimination experienced by lesbians, gays and bisexuals (LGB) in Australian sporting settings. A mixed methods online survey was utilized to collate participant experiences. The findings suggest that, in sport, participants experienced sexism directly and systemically, and homophobia explicitly and implicitly. Women experienced sexism and homophobia, whilst men reported more homophobic events. The most mentioned impacts of discrimination were negative emotions such as sadness, anger, distress and shame, followed by negative engagement with sport such as disliking sport, or avoiding or leaving sport. The well-recognized benefits of sport such as physical and mental well-being, social connections, enjoyment, positive identity and achievement may be more difficult to realize within this context of significant social stress

Comparative and demographic analysis of orang-utan genomes

Orang-utan- is derived from a Malay term meaning man of the forest- and aptly describes the southeast Asian great apes native to Sumatra and Borneo. The orang-utan species, Pongo abelii (Sumatran) and Pongo pygmaeus (Bornean), are the most phylogenetically distant great apes from humans, thereby providing an informative perspective on hominid evolution. Here we present a Sumatran orang-utan draft genome assembly and short read sequence data from five Sumatran and five Bornean orang-utan genomes. Our analyses reveal that, compared to other primates, the orang-utan genome has many unique features. Structural evolution of the orang-utan genome has proceeded much more slowly than other great apes, evidenced by fewer rearrangements, less segmental duplication, a lower rate of gene family turnover and surprisingly quiescent Alu repeats, which have played a major role in restructuring other primate genomes. We also describe a primate polymorphic neocentromere, found in both Pongo species, emphasizing the gradual evolution of orang-utan genome structure. Orang-utans have extremely low energy usage for a eutherian mammal, far lower than their hominid relatives. Adding their genome to the repertoire of sequenced primates illuminates new signals of positive selection in several pathways including glycolipid metabolism. From the population perspective, both Pongo species are deeply diverse; however, Sumatran individuals possess greater diversity than their Bornean counterparts, and more species-specific variation. Our estimate of Bornean/Sumatran speciation time, 400,000years ago, is more recent than most previous studies and underscores the complexity of the orang-utan speciation process. Despite a smaller modern census population size, the Sumatran effective population size (N e) expanded exponentially relative to the ancestral N e after the split, while Bornean N e declined over the same period. Overall, the resources and analyses presented here offer new opportunities in evolutionary genomics, insights into hominid biology, and an extensive database of variation for conservation efforts. © 2011 Macmillan Publishers Limited. All rights reserved

Consensus on exercise reporting template (Cert): Modified delphi study

© 2016 American Physical Therapy Association. Background. Exercise interventions are often incompletely described in reports of clinical trials, hampering evaluation of results and replication and implementation into practice. Objective. The aim of this study was to develop a standardized method for reporting exercise programs in clinical trials: the Consensus on Exercise Reporting Template (CERT). Design and Methods. Using the EQUATOR Network’s methodological framework, 137 exercise experts were invited to participate in a Delphi consensus study. A list of 41 items was identified from a meta-epidemiologic study of 73 systematic reviews of exercise. For each item, participants indicated agreement on an 11-point rating scale. Consensus for item inclusion was defined a priori as greater than 70% agreement of respondents rating an item 7 or above. Three sequential rounds of anonymous online questionnaires and a Delphi workshop were used. Results. There were 57 (response rate=42%), 54 (response rate=95%), and 49 (response rate=91%) respondents to rounds 1 through 3, respectively, from 11 countries and a range of disciplines. In round 1, 2 items were excluded; 24 items reached consensus for inclusion (8 items accepted in original format), and 16 items were revised in response to participant suggestions. Of 14 items in round 2, 3 were excluded, 11 reached consensus for inclusion (4 items accepted in original format), and 7 were reworded. Sixteen items were included in round 3, and all items reached greater than 70% consensus for inclusion. Limitations. The views of included Delphi panelists may differ from those of experts who declined participation and may not fully represent the views of all exercise experts. Conclusions. The CERT, a 16-item checklist developed by an international panel of exercise experts, is designed to improve the reporting of exercise programs in all evaluative study designs and contains 7 categories: materials, provider, delivery, location, dosage, tailoring, and compliance. The CERT will encourage transparency, improve trial interpretation and replication, and facilitate implementation of effective exercise interventions into practice