Research Methods

Methodological Approach

This study utilizes a mixed-methods approach, with quantitative demographic data collection and qualitative data collection in the form of open-ended survey and interview questions. The investigator comes from a background in anthropology, history, and folklore and employs an ethnographic, oral history approach.

Study Participants

Ethical Considerations

Written informed consent was provided by each participant via a digital survey with an informed consent question that was mandatory in order to continue the survey.

Group Characteristics

Of 153 responses, 149 fit the inclusion criteria and were included in the study.

The majority of participants were white (100), with seven Asian Americans, five Black or African Americans, five Native Americans or Alaska Natives, and two Native Hawaiians or other Pacific Islanders. 115 participants were non-Hispanic/Latinx and five were Hispanic/Latinx. Most were born between 1986 and 2001, with the majority born between 1996-2000. Participants were fairly equally spread out geographically, with a slight majority living in California and Washington state. The majority grew up in suburban neighborhoods, then rural, then urban, then military bases. Socioeconomic class was evenly spread between upper middle class, middle class, lower middle class, and working class, with smaller numbers coming from the lower class and the upper class.

53 participants were women, 32 were men, and 31 were nonbinary, with a smattering of other gender identities (agender, Two-Spirit, girlflux, demigirl, autigender, demiagender, fa’atane, multigender, genderqueer, neutrois, and genderfluid), and two questioning. 50 participants were transgender/nonbinary and 67 were cisgender, with one questioning and two culturally-specific genders (fa’atane and māhū). Gender pronouns were spread fairly evenly between she/her, he/him, and they/them, with two people considering neopronouns and one person with no preference. Seven participants were intersex and 108 non-intersex, with two unsure. Most participants were lesbian, gay, bisexual, queer, pansexual, and/or asexual, with lower numbers of straight, grey-aromantic, demi-pansexual, demisexual, and biromantic participants.

Inclusion/Exclusion Criteria

In order to be included in the study, participants were required to be 18 years of age or older; identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex, or asexual; and live in the United States during adolescence.

One survey was excluded because it was a duplicate. Three surveys were excluded because the participants did not live in the United States.

Data Collection

Recruitment

I shared the survey link to my personal contacts through email and Facebook; some of these shared the link on their personal pages. I also shared the survey link on this website where it could be seen by anyone. I also shared the survey link in targeted community groups and organizations on Facebook and Reddit. I recruited more heavily in demographics that are less visible (asexuals, intersex folks, and transfeminine folks).

Survey Instrument

The survey included a detailed introduction with risks and benefits of participating and a list of crisis lines in case of emotional upset. The informed consent question was the only question that was required to move on with the rest of the survey.

Participants chose their level of personal identification (anonymous and aggregate only, assigned pseudonym, or chosen pseudonym or first name). Those who selected assigned pseudonym received a simple pseudonym of a letter of the alphabet. When participants exceeded the number of letters in the alphabet, I added an A to the next round of letters (i.e., AA, BA, CA, etc.). I refrained from choosing names because I did not want to make assumptions about gendered or culturally specific names.

The first section of questions were ticky box or single answer questions about demographics. The second section of questions were broad, open-ended questions about specific adolescent experiences. Participants could write as much or as little as they wished. Questions focused on sex ed, puberty, parent and peer involvement, gender, sexuality, coming out, gender transition, and things participants wished had been different growing up.

The survey was live for 30 days.

Follow-Up Interviews

After reading through the survey responses, I selected ten participants for follow-up interviews. Follow-up interview participants were chosen by their willingness to participate (the final question of the survey inquired if the participant was interested in a follow-up interview) and the researcher’s desire to capture the experiences of diverse participants. I attempted to select an even spread of participants by transgender status, gender identity, sexual orientation, intersex status, ethnicity, age, geographic region, neighborhood, and socioeconomic class.

Follow-up interviews were conducted according to each participant’s communication preference. Interviews were conducted via telephone call, text, email, Google Video, and in person. Questions probed further into each participant’s specific situation. For example, one participant mentioned being Autistic, so I asked if their neurodivergence had any impact on their gender journey. Another participant had a lot to say about asexuality resources. Another had insight into how their culturally-specific gender interacted with their ethnicity and the wider (white) society’s understandings of gender.

Library and Archival Research

Besides ethnographic data collection, I also conducted library and archival research. Please see the “Bibliography” tab for a partial list of books I read. I am also using several data sets, including the GLSEN National School Climate Survey and other data on queer youth homelessness, suicidality, and interpersonal violence.

Data Analysis

I utilized grounded theory to analyze data. After data collection, I reviewed each survey and interview several times, noting repeated experiences, themes, and phrases. Then I made a list of codes from these repeated ideas and went through the data, marking each time the idea was mentioned. In secondary coding, I grouped the themes into categories. For example, the category Sex Education had three themes: Learned From, Learned About, and Quality of Learning. Each theme had several subthemes; for Quality of Learning some of the subthemes are Abstinence-Only, Heteronormative, Religious, and Comprehensive.

From there I was able to organize chapters and pull relevant quotes.