Gender and Sex concepts

 

The concepts of gender and sex appear interchangeable in common usage. Scientists use the concepts of sex and gender in different ways. Behavioral scientists and healthcare professionals attend to the ways people identify their gender. These concepts have changed in recent years and may change in the years ahead.

Sex and Gender

Sex refers to biological status and is usually identified as birth. The concept, birth sex, is in common use. Sex is typically based on external features thus, female or male but some infants present a mixed appearance previously called intersex.

Gender is a social construct. In psychology, concepts like man, woman, girl, and boy are in common use. For most people, gender terms match sex terms thus girls and women are female, boys and men are male.

Gender Concepts

Culture influences the way people talk, dress, and act. In some cultures masculinity and femininity are very different. 

Agender is a term used by some who do not identify with any gender. It is different from nonbinary.

Cisgender (short form, cis) refers to a match between gender identity and birth sex.

FTM is an initialism for female-to-male, which refers to a trans man.

Gender Affirming Surgery (GAS) refers to any surgery that changes a person's body to match a person's gender. Also GCS.

Gender Confirming Surgery (GCS) refers to any surgery that changes a person's body to match a person's gender. Also GAS.

Gender dysphoria is the experience of distress related to the mismatch between a person's birth sex and their gender identity, which interferes with one or more dimensions of functioning such as in relationships, at school, at work, and so forth.

Gender expression is the way a person behaves within a cultural context of gender norms, which include voice, mannerisms, choice of clothing, interests, and so forth. Descriptions of gender expression include adjectives like feminine, masculine, and androgynous.

Gender identity is our sense of our own gender. Most people identify with their birth sex.

Gender nonconforming refers to people who do not fit the gender norms within their culture.

Intersectionality is the concept that self-identity may be influenced by multiple social experiences interacting with personal characteristics, which interact such that people experience their society differently. Experiences may be different based on national origin, ethnicity, physical abilities, gender, and so forth. The term has been politicized and lost its academic meaning.

MTF is an initialism for male-to-female, which refers to a trans woman.

Nonbinary is a term some people use when their sense of gender does not fit the categories of man or woman. The term genderqueer may be used.

Transitioning refers to the process of a transgender person changing the way they identify and live out their gender identity. The process can include social (e.g., relationships, names), medical (e.g., hormones, surgery), and legal changes (e.g., gender and sex terms on legal documents). These changes vary from person to person.

Transgender (short form, trans) describes a person who does not identify with their birth sex. 

Trans man or transgender man is a transgender person whose gender identity is that of a man and the identity does not match his birth sex. 

Trans woman or transgender woman is a transgender person whose gender identity is that of a woman and the identity does not match her birth sex.

QPOC is an initialism for Queer Person of Color or Queer People of Color.

Queer is a general gender concept for people who are not straight.

Sex and Sexuality Concepts

Most people experience sexual attraction to others. Sexual orientation refers to the focus of attraction. The attraction may be romantic, emotional, physical, or both emotional and physical. 

Abromantic is a term used by people who report experiencing different romantic attractions throughout their lives. They may also change their sexual orientation. Although some use the term interchangeably with abrosexual, for others, abromantic can mean a desire for romantic relationships with or without sex.

Abrosexual refers to people who report experiencing different sexual or romantic attractions throughout their lives. They may also change their sexual orientation. Some use the term abromantic to mean the same thing but there can be differences. A person who identifies as abrosexual may desire sex but not be interested in a romantic relationship.

Asexual is a term describing people do not experience sexual attraction (short version, ace). 

Assigned sex is the identification of a person's sex listed as male or female usually based on external anatomy. Other terms are birth sex, natal sex, biological sex, and sex.

Binding is the process of wrapping breasts to decrease the appearance of breasts.

Birth sex is the identification of a person's sex listed as male or female usually based on external anatomy. Other terms are assigned sex, natal sex, biological sex, and sex.

Bisexual people who experience emotional and sexual attraction to men and women.

Disorders of Sexual Development (DSD) is a broad term for biological conditions

Heteronormativity is the assumption that all people are either male or female, their gender is based on their birth sex, and this is the normal condition of humans. Other conditions are considered abnormal and inferior.

Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT) is process of changing one's body affected by hormones like estrogen and testosterone.

Intersex is a term describing people who do not have typical male or female sex characteristics at birth. The sex differences may not be external but may be internal and include hormones, chromosomes, and reproductive organs. Professionals may use the term DSD.

Natal sex is the identification of a person's sex listed as male or female usually based on external anatomy. Other terms are assigned sex, birth sex, biological sex, and sex.

Pansexual a person who experiences emotional or sexual attraction to people regardless of their sex or gender identity.

Sex Reassignment Surgery (SRS) is a surgical procedure modifying an aspect of sexual anatomy to match gender.

Sexual Orientation. The sexual orientation of transpersons varies. They may be straight, gay, lesbian, or bisexual. A person who is only attracted women and transitions from woman to man would be a straight man. A person who is only attracted to men and transitions from woman to man would be a gay man.

Communication About Sex and Gender

Some people list their pronouns in emails and in social media. This can help with identity.

Their, them, and they used to refer to more than one person but is commonly used, and accepted in some editorial formats like APA, to refer to one person.

Most people just list two pronouns like he/ him, she/ her.

LGBTQ+ The letters vary somewhat but refer to lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer (or questioning), and the plus sign for additional terms.

Distress

Some people experience considerable distress when their birth sex does not match their inner sense of gender identity but people around them treat them according to the gender they have been assigned since birth.

Comments

I will be pleased to make corrections in response to respectful comments.

Resources

APA Journal   Psychology of Sexual Orientation and Gender Diversity

APA Transgender

APA Sexual orientation and gender identity

APA definitions and pronouns

APA singular use of "they"

WebMD Sexual Orientation

American Counseling Association LGBTQ+

CDC resources for LGBT health

Photo credit Bing search, free to share and use

I am a retired psychologist and professor of psychology who writes about psychology.

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Self-Concept and Self-Identity

 

Who Am I?

SELF-CONCEPT

The concept, self-concept, has been used by psychologists to refer to a mental construct known as the self. The self or self-concept is our view of who we are, which is based upon the content of our memories about ourselves. The self-concept is not a total perspective on ourselves but rather a view that depends on information in our awareness. Some of the information about ourselves consists of private knowledge and other views are based on feedback from others in numerous social contexts throughout the time of our life. Thus, self-concept is both a personal mental construct and a social construct.

Self-concept is both a personal and a social construct.

   Self-concept begins to develop before children have speech as evident from studies of children responding to themselves in mirrors. They retain an image of themselves. Our self-image is part of our self-concept.

   As in the SCOPES model where the first S represents the self, the self, or self-concept, is a mental construct that organizes information about ourselves and draws on information from the remaining four personal dimensions represented as COPE (Cognitions, Observable behavior patterns, Physiology, Emotions) all within a social context, the final S.

Self-concept, Sutton, G. W. 2023

SELF-IDENTITY

   Self-identity is like a role we enact as part of a social group. Self-identity is who we are (self-concept) in a social context. Our roles include such common identity-creating experiences as student, worker, lover, parent, child, and so forth. The social context where we live out these roles demands we act in certain ways. By way of these demands or expectations, social groups shape our identity within the group and thereby influence our self-concept. Thus, schools, religious and social organizations, businesses, political groups, friendship groups, couple dyads, and families influence our multiple identities. Note that some writers appear to use the terms self-concept and self-identity interchangeably. I take the view that self-identities are components of one's self-concept.

Self-identity, Sutton, G. W. 2023

   Self-identities exist in a network and vary in degree of saliency in response to a social context. A psychologist providing psychotherapy may get word that their child has been taken to a hospital. The startling event makes the parent role salient and temporarily sets aside the career identity.

Most people are religious or spiritual. For many, their spirituality is a highly important aspect of who they are. Thus, we see people clarifying their religious or spiritual identity on social media sites. They proclaim the beliefs and values of their religious group and sometimes challenge the beliefs and values of those who would discredit their faith. In the process, we learn the importance of their spiritual identity.

   Race and ethnic identities are also very important to functioning in many cultures. Skin color, clothing, physical appearance, language and accent are some of the ways society identifies people as part of a particular group labeled as a race or ethnicity. In some contexts, laws, policies, and finances are tied to being a member of an identified racial or ethnic group, which draws attention to those who are in one group and those who are not.

   Gender Identity is a recent topic with an expanding literature. The terminology has changed rapidly as scientists and clinicians listened to people's experiences about ways to understand gender identity and how people with different gender identities interact with others, which includes sexual orientation.

   Identity theory considers how groups and people interact in a dynamic way shaping the self and the group. An example of this interaction can be seen in the interaction of political and religious identities influencing morality (e.g., see Sutton et al., 2019).

SELF-EFFICACY

Self-efficacy is the perception that a person can act in a way to achieve a desired goal. In 1977, Albert Bandura of Stanford University wrote an extensive article on the theory of self-efficacy. He proposed that our perceptions of self-efficacy come from four sources: “performance accomplishments, vicarious experience, verbal persuasion, and physiological states (191).” Click to read more on Self-Efficacy.

BOOKS BY ALBERT BANDURA ON SELF-EFFICACY & RELATED CONCEPTS

SELF-ESTEEM

Self-esteem is the value people place on themselves. We learn our value in various social contexts. We are better at somethings and not other things. Self-esteem appears to influence performance in various life tasks. There are several measures of self-esteem--see links below.

SELF-AWARENESS

Our awareness of various dimensions of ourselves. The focus of our awareness varies throughout a day. When focused on some activity, we ignore other aspects of our functioning. For example, some of us can ignore pain when we are busily engaged in the pursuit of some goal.

Notes

Note that psychological scientists have not been consistent in the way they use terms like self and self-concept. This lack of consistency is why I recommend thinking of the self and self-concept as equivalent. In addition, the terms self and self-concept have been criticized for being vague or as philosophers say, they are “fuzzy concepts.” Moreover, some clinicians see people as having multiple self-concepts, which may be akin to experiences of people presenting as if they have multiple personalities or, functioning in dissociative states. Regardless of the disagreements, there is a large body of research about self-concepts and related terms and some evidence indicates that aspects of our self-concepts influence behavior.

To learn more about self-concept and self-identity, see the review by Oyserman et al. (2012). Also, see many of the books and articles by Roy F. Baumeister and his colleagues.

References

Oyserman, D. & Elmore, K. & Smith, G. (2012) Self, self-concept, and

identity. J. Tangney and M. Leary (Eds). The Handbook of Self and Identity, 2nd

Edition, pp 69-104, New York, NY: Guilford Press.

 

Sutton, G. W., Kelly, H. L., & Huver, M. (2019). Political identities, religious identity, and the pattern of moral foundations among conservative Christians. Journal of Psychology and Theology, 48, pp. 169-187. Online October 16, 2019. Issue published September 1, 2020. ResearchGate Link     Academia Link

 

Related Concept Posts

 

Self-concept, Identity, and Politics

 

Self-Efficacy

 

SCOPES model

 

Related Scales and Questionnaires

 

Personal Self-Concept Questionnaire

Academic Self-Efficacy Scale for Students

Academic Self-Efficacy Scale

New General Self-Efficacy Scale

Gender-Identity-Dysphoria Questionnaire

Racism Scale

Ambivalent Sexism Inventory

Measuring Spiritual Beliefs

Measuring Spiritual Practices

Measuring Religious Fundamentalism

 

 

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