Even as transgender and gender non-conforming people become more accepted in society, they still

face a lot of challenges, including bullying, prejudice, and stigma.

In this episode, we speak with a psychologist who not only treats transgender and gender non-conforming people,

but is actively researching how they fight back against these challenges and continue to thrive and succeed despite them.

I'm Audrey Hamilton, and this is Speaking of Psychology.

Annalise Singh is an associate professor at the University of Georgia

and co-founder of the Georgia Safe Schools Coalition and Trans-Resilience Project.

Singh's research, practice, and advocacy have centered on the resilience of transgender people, youth, and people of color.

She was also on the American Psychological Association's Joint Task Force to develop guidelines for psychological

practice with transgender and gender non-conforming clients. Welcome, Dr. Singh. Thank you.

It's good to be here. You've been selected to take part in a National Institutes of Health-funded

study with other researchers to examine how transgender people came to accept their gender identity.

Can you talk more about this study?

Sure. We're really excited about this study because it's the first longitudinal study that is specifically looking at transgender identity development. And the reason that that is important is

because most of the federally funded research for transgender people has mostly centered around more pathological issues such as HIV and AIDS, risk, whereas this longitudinal study is not only looking at risk that transgender people might face in their identity development over the lifespan, but it's also looking at resilience, which is a really important part of coping

and navigating trans prejudice for trans people. So we're very excited to be collaborating with

the University of Georgia, San Francisco State University, and Columbia. So it feels like it's the start

of a new day in transgender research. Now, as part of the Trans-Resilience Project, you have been studying transgender people's resilience in the face of discrimination specifically.

You know, why do you think it's important to explore resilience among the transgender community?

That's a great question.

I think one of the things we know is we look back at transgender resilience and transgender

research is that resilience has been an understudy construct so for instance we know pretty well

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