Capital Wired

Keeps You Updated

Monday, January 25, 2021
Log in
  • Headlines
  • Business
  • Health
  • Tech & Science
  • Sports
  • World
  • US
  • Latest News
    • How To Make Your Own Home-Brewed Morphine
    • Using Mouthwash Too Often Puts You at Risk of Obesity and Diabetes
    • Walmart to Solve its Supply Chain Issues and Further Cut Down on Costs
    • The World’s Most Expensive Christmas Decorations
    • Netflix Hopes to Balance Data Limit With Great Video Quality
    • Joji Morishita says Japan Will Resume Whaling
    • The Most Beloved Plastic Surgeries Among Americans
    • Skype for Web Allows Non-Users to Take Part In Its Online Chats

Pages

  • About Capital Wired
  • Contact Us
  • Privacy Policy GDPR
  • Reprint & Licensing
  • Staff
  • Terms of Use

Recent Posts

  • Here’s Why Your Brain Keeps Worrying about Everything June 29, 2018
  • Don’t Throw That Sunscreen after Summer Is Up June 29, 2018
  • Analysts: Currency War between U.S. and China Might Be Looming June 28, 2018
  • Starbucks Rival The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf Opening 100 Shops June 27, 2018
  • Study Finds We Are Alone in the Universe June 26, 2018
  • Restaurant Owner Not Sorry for Booting Sarah Sanders June 26, 2018
  • Beware of the Hidden Salt in Your Food! June 25, 2018

Supporting Young Transgender Children Has A Beneficial Effect

February 29, 2016 By Germaine Hicks Leave a Comment

Tom and Julia

Letting transgender kids live openly can be an incredibly affirming process, study shows.

New study shows that supporting young transgender children has a beneficial effect on their mental health. When young transgender children are allowed to live openly as the gender they identify with and they get heaps of parental support, they fare much better psychologically.

We know that some children have a gender identity that is different from their sex assigned at birth, and many have interests and hobbies that may align with the other gender. Some children, however, do not identify with either gender. They may feel like they are somewhere in between or have no gender.

For some young children, expressing a wish to be or identifying as another gender may be temporary; for others, it is not. Only time can tell. Some children who are gender non-conforming in early childhood grow up to become transgender adults (persistently identifying with a gender that is different from their birth sex), and others do not.

Researchers suggest that gender is something we are born with; it can’t be changed by any interventions. It is critically important that children feel loved and accepted for who they are. On that note, a small study published in the journal Pediatrics has shown that young transgender children allowed to live openly as the gender they identify with seem no more anxious or depressed than other children.

The secret seems to be support and acceptance, the researchers report. The findings are reassuring after a series of reports that indicated transgender individuals in the United States often had high rates of anxiety, depression, and suicide.

The thinking has always been that kids who are not acting gender-stereotypically are basically destined to have mental health problems.

stated Kristina Olson of the University of Washington, who led the study.

Olson’s team studied 73 kids aged 3 to 12. Their parents were asked whether their children had experienced symptoms of depression or anxiety during the past week. They found the transgender kids averaged an anxiety score of 50.1 on a National Institutes of Health scale – almost the same as the national norm of 50.

Also, research has shown that transgender children whose parents pressure them to conform, when compared with accepting, supportive parents, have a four times higher suicide and drug abuse rate, twice the risk of contracting HIV/AIDS and a five times greater chance of suffering depression.

Rates of anxiety among trans kids were ‘a smidge higher’ than national averages for children of the same age, but otherwise they matched national norms, declared Kristina Olson. She added that it’s the largest study to examine the psychological health of transgender youth who have socially transitioned.

However, the study certainly suggests that family support is linked to better mental health, although that idea wasn’t tested directly and Olson affirmed that the results don’t prove that is the explanation for the children’s well-being.

The findings are ‘truly stunning’, given previous studies showing high rates of mental health problems including suicidal behaviour in transgender children, as Dr. Ilana Sherer, a Dublin, California, pediatrician, wrote in a Pediatrics editorial.

Micah Heumann, an academic adviser at the University of Illinois’s Champaign campus, was among study participants. His 10-year-old child, Daniel, was born a girl and named Naima, but has identified as a boy ever since he knew about gender, Heumann declared.

In second grade, the family agreed to let Daniel legally change his name and at the boy’s request, his school agreed to go along with the change, even letting Daniel use the boy’s bathroom. Daniel was very well-adjusted, but still felt stress because he knew that not everyone was so accepting, Heumann added.

Heumann also declared that the family reacted to Daniel’s choice with mixed feelings, mourning the loss of a daughter but never wavering in love and support for Daniel.

Olson, the study author, said the results don’t apply to all transgender kids, especially those whose parents oppose their change in identity. Opponents of allowing these youngsters to adopt names, hairstyles, clothes and pronouns opposite their birth gender have argued that kids so young cannot possibly know their gender at such an early age.

All in all, the findings of this study sustain that letting these kids live openly as the gender they identify with can be an incredibly affirming process, showing the child that their identity is truly supported.

Image Source: guim.co.uk.

Filed Under: Health Tagged With: anxiety, anxiety disorders, Kristina Olson, mental health, mental health disorders, mental health problems, Micah Heumann, Pediatrics, transgender, transgender children, transgender kids, young transgender children

Cannabis Use Is Not Linked To Anxiety Disorders After All

February 19, 2016 By Jason Leathers Leave a Comment

Quit-Smoking-Weed

Study shows marijuana is not a benign drug.

It turns out that cannabis use is not linked to anxiety disorders after all. New research found that using marijuana as an adult is not associated with a variety of mood and anxiety disorders, including depression and bipolar disorder.

Of course, this is quite a challenge to some previous research that has shown that marijuana use is associated with depression and anxiety.

In order to come to a conclusion, the researchers examined the records of nearly 35,000 U.S. adults who participated in the National Epidemiologic Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions. They examined the prevalence of marijuana use among the study participants in 2001 and 2002. The experts checked on the participants’ rates of mental-health problems three years later.

Then, after controlling for a variety of confounding factors, such as socio-demographic characteristics, family history and environment, and past and present psychiatric disorders, they finally discovered their answer. Cannabis use was definitely not associated with increased risk for developing mood or anxiety disorders.

It may sound like good news, but don’t get enthusiastic just yet – there is a downside to this discovery. The same study did find, however, an association between marijuana use and later substance use disorders, such as abuse of and dependence on alcohol, tobacco, marijuana and drugs.

Specifically, at the three-year follow-up, marijuana users were about six times more likely to have any substance use disorder; nearly three times as likely to have an alcohol disorder; and about 10 times as likely to report any marijuana use disorder. This isn’t necessarily surprising: it’s fairly obvious that if you use a substance, you’re putting yourself at risk of a substance-use disorder.

In short, people who use one drug often use others. This is as true of marijuana as it is of alcohol.

The findings concerning cannabis raise the question of whether alcohol use also contributes to the risk of subsequent substance use disorders.

lead author Mark Olfson of Columbia University said in an email. But that issue is beyond the scope of the current study, he added.

On the other hand, the findings on mental health are more interesting, given the conflicting picture portrayed by previous research. Olfson and his colleagues think some prior evidence of links between marijuana and psychiatric disorders could be due more to confounding factors than anything else.

The new study adds to prior research discrediting the connection between marijuana and common mental-health disorders. And it’s important, because much of the federal government’s current literature on marijuana includes claims about links between marijuana and depression that are inaccurate in light of the latest findings.

For example, the Drug Enforcement Administration makes these claims in its official fact sheet on marijuana. And in its 2014 publication, the DEA mentions ‘depression’ no fewer than 14 times, claiming that pot is linked to depression among teens, adults and even dogs.

Also, given that these documents are used to inform policy at the federal level and below, it is crucial that they reflect the best, most accurate research. This is especially true given the rapidly changing marijuana-policy landscape today.

All in all, this particular study is a step forward and the message coming out of it is that marijuana is not a benign drug.

Image Source: cooleasymagictricks.com.

Filed Under: Health Tagged With: alcohol abuse, anxiety, anxiety disorders, benign drugs, cannabis, DEA, depression, Drug Enforcement Administration, Marijuana, marijuana use, Mark Olfson, mental health disorders, new findings, research, substance use, weed

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Recent Articles

dc logo on black galaxy background

Ava DuVernay to Direct DC’s New Gods Adaptation

March 16, 2018 By Rebecca McGhee Leave a Comment

leonardo davinci's signature in black

Is DaVinci’s Record Breaking Painting Authentic?

November 20, 2017 By Rebecca McGhee Leave a Comment

stephen hawking

Stephen Hawking Makes Gloomy Prediction For Earth In A 100 Years

May 7, 2017 By Deborah Nielsen Leave a Comment

"Dwayne Johnson not dead"

Dwayne Johnson Died this Week or Not

January 19, 2016 By Jason Leathers 3 Comments

There Are At Least Three More Seasons of Game of Thrones To Go

July 31, 2015 By Rebecca McGhee Leave a Comment

Homelessness Soars in L.A., Officials Pledge to House Everybody by 2016

May 12, 2015 By Brian Galloway Leave a Comment

FBI Releases National Report on Slain Police Officers, Figures are Alarming

May 12, 2015 By Rebecca McGhee Leave a Comment

New York Nuclear Plant Partially Shut Down due to Hudson Oil Slick

May 11, 2015 By Jason Leathers 2 Comments

Obama Draws Heat from Democrats over Asia Trade Deal

May 9, 2015 By Rebecca McGhee Leave a Comment

Florida Governor Changes Stance on Obamacare Once More, Budget on Hold

May 9, 2015 By Brian Galloway Leave a Comment

Secret Service to add an Extra Layer of Spikes to White House Fence

May 8, 2015 By Chen Lai Leave a Comment

Police Arrested Suspect in death of Student who tried to Sell Car on Craigslist

May 8, 2015 By Deborah Nielsen 1 Comment

AccuWeather.com: 2015 Atlantic Tropical Storm Season is Officially Open

May 7, 2015 By Deborah Nielsen Leave a Comment

Illinois Student Found Dead after Trying to Sell his Car on Craigslist

May 7, 2015 By Deborah Nielsen 2 Comments

Categories

  • Business
  • Headlines
  • Health
  • Sports
  • Tech & Science
  • US
  • World

Copyright © 2021 capitalwired.com

About · Privacy Policy · Terms of Use · Contact

This website uses cookies to ensure you get the best experience on our website. Learn more.