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Transgender Identity

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In recent years, a growing body of research and literature from a variety of professional organizations, such as the American Psychological Association (APA) and the World Professional Association of Transgender Health (WPATH), has attempted to better understand and meet the needs of transgender individuals and the clinicians who provide their care. This is reflective of a societal shift towards inclusion, as well as a growing number of transgender individuals on the caseloads of clinicians. The APA, for example, made changes to the fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders in 2013 to reduce stigma and improve clinical care available to the transgender community. Specifically, the DSM-5, “changed gender identity …show more content…

Thus, the overall aim of voice and communication therapy is to help transgender clients adapt their voice in a way that is safe and authentic, allowing their communication patterns to be congruent with their gender identity (Adler, Hirsch, & Mordaunt, 2006).
Speech-language pathologists work along with transgender clients in order to help them develop voice and communication skills that align with their physical appearance, age, and that are consistent with the both their individual expectations and those of society for that person’s gender identity (Hancock & Haskin, 2015). This involves teaching them how to adjust pitch, loudness and stress patterns, intonation, articulation, speech rate and phrasing, voice quality, resonance, language, and nonverbal communication in order to adopt speech patterns and conversation styles characteristic of the client’s gender identity (Coleman et al., 2012; Hancock & Haskin, 2015). Because speech feminization or masculinization involves changing the habitual use of the voice production mechanism, it is important to involve speech-language pathologists in this process in order to prevent causing damage to the vocal tract, or the exacerbation of an existing voice disorder (Davies & Goldberg, 2006; Coleman et al., 2012). …show more content…

As mentioned previously, in order to work with and counsel transgender clients, it is imperative that the clinician possesses basic “trans-competence,” or transgender cultural competence, in addition to the clinical skills relating to speech and voice science, and trans-specific assessment, treatment and outcomes (Davies & Goldberg, 2006). Furthermore, a counseling relationship requires mutual and genuine care, respect, trust, and support, which are necessary for the establishment of rapport, the facilitation of a more open and efficient communication and engagement in therapy, as well as, the creation of a safe therapeutic environment that promotes a “feeling of positive anticipation” and change (Davies & Goldberg,

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