A new study shows that young transgender children rarely revert to their original assigned genders if they live for five years with their chosen social choices like names, pronouns and clothing style honored, the New York Times reports.
In the largest study of its kind, researchers tracked 317 children between the ages of 3 and 12 who undertook a social transition–changing identifiers such as names, pronouns and clothing–for at least five years. The average age of child seeking a transition was 6.5 years.
After the five years, only 2.5% of the participants had reverted back to their previous gender identity. The others had continued on in their gender discovery, with some even going so far as to start homone-based treatments to help their development align with their gender identities.
“There’s this sort of idea that the kids are going to be starting those things and that they’re going to change their minds,” said Kristina Olson, a psychologist at Princeton University who led the study. “And at least in our sample, we’re not finding that.”
The study plans to study the cohort for at least 20 years to track their characteristics. The study provides the first long-term study on transgender development at a time when culture warriors want to make teaching about LGBTQ issues in schools a campaign talking point.