Gender minority stress and gender dysphoria: Expanding the minority stress framework

The purpose of this study was to validate the orignal Gender Minority Stress Model (GMSM) (Hendricks & Testa, 2012) in a U.S. population, as it has only been tested in international populations (e.g., Jäggi et al., 2018; Scandurra et al., 2017; Scandurra et al., 2018). A second aim of this study was to test relational support, attachment security, and gender dysphoria as additional variables within the model, as they have been previously related to psychological distress (Amodeo et al., 2015; Cronin et al., 2019; Lefevor et al., 2019). An online purposive sample of transgender and nonbinary adults were recruited (N = 199). The results of this study both validated the original model and suggested that these variables can be incorporated into the GMSM (Hendricks & Testa, 2012). Relational support and attachment security were significantly related to psychological distress. Additionally, gender minority stressors had a positive relationship with gender dysphoria, suggesting gender dysphoria can serve as an additional form of psychological distress within the theoretical framework. Implications for clinicians, mental health educators, and researchers are provided.