Article Sections

Introduction

Gender dysphoria is characterized by distress due to an incongruence between experienced gender (ie, gender identity) and gender assigned at birth.  The desire to live and be treated as a different gender is persistent and intense and associated with significant distress and/or functional impairment.

Terminology

Sex:  the assignment of male or female, usually at or before birth, based on external sexual anatomy and/or chromosomal makeup (ie, sex assigned at birth).

Gender:  specific characteristics (eg, roles, behaviors, expectations) that a society associates with masculinity and femininity (ie, social construct of what it means to be a woman, man, girl, or boy); these characteristics vary among societies and change over time.

Gender identity:  a person's internal sense of being male, female, a combination of both, or neither.

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Tables

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