I’ll just comment here - this study lacks appropriate controls. The children appear to be statistically indistinguishable from the overall population at the last time point, despite receiving exceptional support and medical care their entire lives. But is the background population the right control group? How many dysphoric children resolved on their own with similar supporting environments? And if you received such excellent support wouldn’t you expect other measures of well being to be higher?
And of course, it is not clear what these results have to do with the current wave of post pubescent kids who suddenly “discover” they are actually the other gender.
I've explicitly tried to avoid giving any opinion on the methodology, the data or the wider validity of the claims - just to give a neutral-as-possible summary of what the paper itself says, as a starting point for further discussion.
That said, I think these are all good questions.
They don't give an average age for the onset of dysphoria, but in order to be accepted onto the trial they had to have "shown persistent gender dysphoria since childhood". So that would explicitly exclude those whose dysphoria began in adolescence - which, as you say, brings into question its relevance to the cohort we currently see being treated. The exclusion of comorbid conditions is another example.
There's a lot to say on this data and the way it has been used to justify a number of things - I'm certainly planning on writing up some thoughts on that.
What was the average age of onset of gender dysphoria in this paper? Clearly before puberty - in this study (different group) it was 8 years old https://publications.aap.org/pediatrics/article/doi/10.1542/peds.2021-056082/186992/Gender-Identity-5-Years-After-Social-Transition. I am sorry, at that age most of these kids probably believed Santa Claus is real...
I’ll just comment here - this study lacks appropriate controls. The children appear to be statistically indistinguishable from the overall population at the last time point, despite receiving exceptional support and medical care their entire lives. But is the background population the right control group? How many dysphoric children resolved on their own with similar supporting environments? And if you received such excellent support wouldn’t you expect other measures of well being to be higher?
And of course, it is not clear what these results have to do with the current wave of post pubescent kids who suddenly “discover” they are actually the other gender.
I've explicitly tried to avoid giving any opinion on the methodology, the data or the wider validity of the claims - just to give a neutral-as-possible summary of what the paper itself says, as a starting point for further discussion.
That said, I think these are all good questions.
They don't give an average age for the onset of dysphoria, but in order to be accepted onto the trial they had to have "shown persistent gender dysphoria since childhood". So that would explicitly exclude those whose dysphoria began in adolescence - which, as you say, brings into question its relevance to the cohort we currently see being treated. The exclusion of comorbid conditions is another example.
There's a lot to say on this data and the way it has been used to justify a number of things - I'm certainly planning on writing up some thoughts on that.