10-Year Post-Ph.D. Post

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633552940369053406hoodingam.pnghoodingmyk

left: my graduate mentor hooding me; middle & right: hooding my first two Ph.D. students

I graduated with a Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology 10 years ago! I thought I’d reflect on that by responding to a tweet by Nathan C. Hall (check out the full thread of responses to his tweet here, an article on it here, and discussion of it on a podcast here.

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1. Don’t despair when you’ve invested a lot of time in a study and the results are not statistically significant. There’s a future process coming that will allow you to publish these studies as long as they’re rigorous (Registered Reports).

2. Even though mentoring graduate students provokes a lot of uncertain/anxious feelings, it will end up being one of the most meaningful aspects of your job.

3. You overestimate how much your treatment of people influences how they treat you. People’s goals, personalities, motivations, and other incentives guide their behavior too (more so than yours in some cases).

4. When deciding what to teach within time constraints, prioritize depth over breadth and make time to teach students about process (e.g., how to find and critically evaluate the research on depression treatment) over content (e.g., reviewing every type of depression treatment currently used).

5. Don’t neglect the importance of sociocultural factors in biopsychosocial models of psychopathology. I didn’t even realize I was almost exclusively focused on biological/psychological factors in my abnormal psychology class until a student commented on it in my evaluations during my first year of teaching. I’m really grateful they did that. It made my subsequent teaching more comprehensive.

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6. Demonstrate the importance of course subject matter by taking time to discuss it within its historical context and current real-world significance (e.g., on intelligence – 1, 2, 3, 4, 5).

7. Even though you think you’ll regret it later, you’ll actually be grateful that you turned down some work opportunities when you were already overloaded with work.

8. If you’re experiencing burnout, try looking at your situation through an operant conditioning lens. Identifying reinforcements, punishments, etc. in your situation can produce problem-solving ideas. This was advice I got from someone else that stuck with me.

9. There are certain types of work in academia that are more frequently and formally recognized and rewarded than others. That doesn’t mean that the other work isn’t of value. Reminding yourself of that with regard to your own and others’ work is important.

10. I don’t know how to phrase this last one except to say that I am extremely grateful for all of the trusted friends and colleagues I have been able to consult when I am unsure of something ranging from scientific to interpersonal aspects of academia. In advice form: don’t hesitate to ask for help from people you trust. And pay it forward when you’re the one who is asked.

 

Suicide Prevention Information & Resources

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This week involved a lot of heartbreaking suicide-related news. We tragically lost Kate Spade and Anthony Bourdain to suicide. We also learned that U.S. suicide rates increased substantially over the past several years. If you want to learn and do more to prevent suicide, I want to help you out by linking to some good sources. I hope you find them useful.

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If you need help:

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline

Trans Lifeline

The Trevor Project (for LGTBQ+ youth)

Veterans Crisis Line

Find a Therapist

Find a Support Group for People Who Have Lost Someone to Suicide

Listen to a Hopeful Music Playlist Made by College Students

Research-Supported Treatments for Adults

Research-Supported Treatments for Children

Feeling Good: The New Mood Therapy by David Burns

How to help others:

Warning Signs

How to Help Someone Who is Suicidal

Take a Mental Health First Aid Training Course

Get involved:

Call Your Representatives and Tell Them to Prioritize Policies linked to Suicide Prevention (e.g., access to quality healthcare, funding for research)

Participate in an Out of Darkness Community Walk

For information:

Suicide Statistics

Suicide Prevention Social Media Chat

Live Through This Photo Project

Wil Wheaton Essay about Mental Health

Rudy Caseres, Mental Health Advocate

Robert Vore, Mental Health Advocate

It Gets Better Project

Why People Die by Suicide by Thomas Joiner

Myths about Suicide by Thomas Joiner

Guns and Suicide by Michael Anestis

Cracked Not Broken by Kevin Hines

Speaking of Suicide by Stacey Freedenthal

Brother Ali’s Song about Losing His Dad to Suicide

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I’ve seen Minneapolis-based rapper Brother Ali in concert several times, and he strikes me as someone who’s as kind as he is talented. When I told him at a Chicago show that I had previously chatted with him in Orlando, he tried to remember me. He told me that he doesn’t recall faces due to albinism-related vision issues, but he recognizes people through reminders of previous conversations. He rapped about his experiences in “Us”: And I go with the feeling from the start/Blind in the eye, so I see you with my heart/And to me all y’all look exactly the same/Fear, faith, compassion and pain.

All of this is to say that I’m a Brother Ali fan and my expectations were high for his 2017 album, All The Beauty In This Whole Life. I think it’s a musical masterpiece, and “Out of Here” is a standout song. The lyrics are a detailed expression of his feelings and thoughts after losing his dad to suicide. In this post, I included all of his lyrics (in bold) and my comments (in italics) with some links to relevant research.

I recommend watching his performance of the song before reading the rest of the post:

Okay so it might appear
To an outsider that you found your way up out of here
They’re saying you died of suicide
People who are suffering may view suicide as an escape from a painful life. I like how Ali phrases the third line, because it removes the stigma associated with other phrasing (e.g., commits suicide).
That’s the last thing I want to hear
They tell me that it’s hardly fair to blame myself
What a hell of a cross to bare
You didn’t say it in your letter
But the fact that I failed you is loud and clear
Suicide can be a particularly painful kind of death to grieve because 1) it means someone you love was deeply hurting and 2) there may be more of a sense that you could have prevented it, if only you had acted differently in some way. It’s a common response for people to tell you that someone’s suicide is not your fault, and yet, it can be hard to refrain from blaming yourself for not stopping the person.
Found out the amount of fear
You would drown when you found yourself naked staring down a mirror
And partners are supposed to lay the cards bare
I left you playing solitaire, and I promise you that I’m sincere
When someone dies by suicide, it might feel like there was a misunderstanding or even a kind of dishonesty between you if you didn’t know the person was contemplating suicide. I think Ali is saying that his dad might have been trying to tell him how he felt (‘lay the cards bare’), but that Ali felt like he failed him by leaving him ‘playing solitaire.’ Powerful imagery.
If you’re looking for some judgment, you won’t find it here
Let’s be honest here
I can’t say I’ve never known that kind of despair
When the clouds appear, how’s life fair
Some people erroneously perceive people who die by suicide as selfish or weak. However, Ali feels compassion and humbly links it to his own experiences. He may also be fearful about his own future (e.g., will his suicidal desire increase to the levels that his dad’s ultimately did?).
I just want to draw you near
As he sorts through the different feelings, there’s a basic desire just to be close to his dad again.
Not to make it about me, but how could you check out
Before you really allowed me a chance to sit down and hear?
I think I would’ve listened
Or were you saying it all along and I just missed it?
You sang your swan song, we all dismissed it
Ali acknowledges that the suicide isn’t about him, but feels a frustration about his father leaving without trying to ask Ali for help first. He then changes course and tries to look for signs that his dad *tried* to reach out, but that Ali missed or ignored it.
Because you filled the room with laughter
I watched when you thought no one was looking at you
In hindsight, I wonder where your smile went
When the party ended and you swallowed it
I saw you swallow it
Sometimes, people who have lost someone to suicide say they saw it coming, but others feel completely shocked. It can also switch back-and-forth in the mind of a person as they try to make sense of it.
Okay so it might appear
That you took yourself up out of here
How many cries soak through your disguise
Before you drown in your silent tears?
Okay so it might appear
That you took yourself up out of here
How many times can you fight for your life
Before you throw that white flag up and volunteer? (x2)
Here, Ali seems to be trying to figure out the threshold that was crossed before his dad killed himself. I don’t know if this is Ali trying to understand if his own life obstacles and past suicidal ideation might ever exceed that threshold or if he is trying to understand his dad’s experience better (or both).
I’ve had car accidents
Where everything is slow motion no matter how fast it’s happening
Every second that pass stretches so that you can watch it unraveling
But can’t always react to it
Your whole life might flash before your eyes
The minute when you transition to the other side
But what can actually happen in that time?
In-between the leaping and the moment you collide
In-between the trigger and the blast
In-between you let go of the wheel and you crash
In-between the moment when you swallow the last pill in the bottle
Turn out the lights, roll the dice on tomorrow
Is there a moment to reflect, can there be regret?
Is there a wait, not yet, let me reset?
Or is it just too painful to accept?
That maybe death just seemed best
I think Ali is trying to imagine what his dad was going through at the time he died by suicide since he cannot ask him about it. He’s wondering if he crossed his dad’s mind or any reluctance emerged that could have prevented his death. Or was it more like an uncontrollable-type of experience where he felt like he was watching himself but could not change the outcome?
Suicide prevention researchers, such as Thomas Joiner (1,2), have argued that an innate drive for survival and fear of death saves the lives of many people who desire suicide. I have heard Joiner describe this as a ‘flinch’ that people might experience right before or during a suicide attempt. He has presented compelling anecdotal evidence of this through stories of people who survived suicide attempts. Kevin Hines, a suicide attempt survivor from the Golden Gate Bridge, said he felt instant regret after he jumped. Along with others, suicide prevention researcher Mike Anestis, has proposed that this window maybe an opportunity to prevent some suicides through means restriction during high risk periods. 
I heard this as Ali arguing for not taking one’s life, even in the face of repeated, seemingly unjust hardships…’you can go down swinging.’
Okay so it might appear
That you took yourself up out of here
I’m trying not to resent you
But you left me defenseless in the life we share
Every man before me in my fam died by his own hands
How am I supposed to understand my own role in the plan
When nobody who grows old stands a chance?
Ali lost both his dad and his grandfather to suicide. He’s wrestling with sympathy for his dad and his own feelings about being left behind.
What about this mysterious dance
Made you cut the cord to the curtain in advance?
But these are questions I can only ask
The person looking back in the looking glass
Ali recognizes that he is full of questions that now must go unanswered.
I’ll close by saying that I am truly sorry if you’ve lost someone to suicide – this post is dedicated to you. I’m especially thinking of a friend who is going through this now. Research by Julie Cerel and colleagues suggests that each suicide affects a large number of people (even larger than previously thought). It’s imperative that we increase the effectiveness of suicide prevention efforts. If you need support, please consider some of the resources below.
Resources
You can find a therapist through the Association of Behavioral and Cognitive Therapy, and you can find a support group for survivors of suicide loss through the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention website.
The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline has an online chat option, and their phone number is 1-800-273-TALK.

Fact-Checking 5 Suicide-Related Statements from a Viral Ben Shapiro Video

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In a YouTube video titled, “Ben Shapiro DESTROYS Transgenderism and Pro-Abortion Arguments,” Shapiro made several claims about suicide. His video currently has 3,126,889 views, which is probably 3,126,885 more views than this blog post will get. Because I feel strongly about making accurate mental health information available to the public, I decided to put a good faith effort into fact-checking the video despite my limited reach. I focused on the suicide-related claims in the video, because I am cautious about commenting on topics outside of my areas of expertise. His statements appear below in bold and my evaluations of their veracity, using empirical data, are beneath them.

1. “The idea behind the transgender movement, as a civil rights movement, is the idea that all of their problems would go away if I would pretend that they were the sex to which they claim membership. That’s nonsense. The transgender suicide rate is 40%. It is 40%.”

False. The American Foundation for Suicide Prevention-Williams Institute study that he appeared to be referencing found that 41% of a sample of transgender and gender-nonconforming (TGNC) adults reported having a lifetime suicide attempt, not a suicide death. The distinction between suicide attempts and suicide deaths is important for reasons directly noted in page 4 of the report:

deaths

It’s possible Shapiro misspoke here and genuinely could not recall the information accurately, but I have not seen a correction released from The Daily Wire despite the highly-viewed video being out for over a year. If you see that a correction has been made, please let me know, and I will update this post.

2. “According to the Anderson School of UCLA, it makes no difference – there’s a study that came out last year – it makes no difference, virtually no difference statistically speaking, as to whether people recognize you as a transgender person or not, which suggests there’s a very high comorbidity between transgenderism  — whatever that mental state may be — and suicidality that has nothing to do with how society treats you.”

False. As mentioned above, I believe that Shapiro meant the Williams Institute of UCLA study instead of the “Anderson School of UCLA,” and that was simply a mistake. But Shapiro gets two things wrong here. First, I am not certain, but based on the context from the full video, I think he misconstrued or misused how “recognition” was defined in the study. The study measured whether people tend to recognize (in the sense that they can tell) that a person is TGNC rather than recognition in the sense I think Shapiro meant (accepting a transgender person’s gender identity as valid — e.g., personally and/or legally). Secondly, there was a statistically significant difference found in the study’s recognition analysis, as seen in pages 8 and 9 of the report:

recognizetext

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Regarding the next part of his claim, how society treats you does appear to be correlated with suicidal ideation and suicide attempts among TGNC individuals, including in the study he referenced (from the Executive Summary, more details on pp. 11-13):

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In a separate study, TGNC youth reported whether or not people called them by their preferred name in 4 domains (home, school, work, friends). They found that chosen name use in more contexts (which the researchers used as a proxy of gender affirmation — i.e., recognizing the validity of their gender identity) was correlated with lower depression symptom levels, less suicidal ideation, and less suicidal behavior. This study was published after his video was made, but I am adding it here for informational purposes.

3. “The idea that the normal suicide rate across the United States is 4% — the suicide rate in the transgender community is 40% — the idea that 36% more transgender people are committing suicide because people are mean to them is ridiculous. It’s not true, and it’s not backed by any science that anyone can cite. It is pure conjecture. In fact, it’s not even true that bullying causes suicide…according to a lot of studies.”

False/Oversimplified. His larger point of comparing TGNC suicide attempt rates to general population rates is informative for characterizing disparities, but the 4% statistic reflects the lifetime suicide attempt rate featured in the report rather than the suicide death rate. Regardless, I don’t think that people typically claim that the entire explanation for the TGNC/general population suicide attempt rate disparity is due to meanness/bullying. Rather, the argument is that certain stressful factors (including some typically considered mean/bullying) may contribute to a higher risk for suicide attempts among transgender people. For example, from page 13 of the report:

stressors.png

Suicidologists do not talk about suicide as being caused by one factor, because there are a multitude of interacting factors at work. That is why I consider the bullying claim to be oversimplified. Moreover, there is scientific evidence that being bullied is associated with higher levels of suicidal ideation and suicide attempts (e.g., 1, 2,3) and that bias-based harassment (e.g., due to sexual orientation or race) is associated with particularly negative effects.

4. “For example, in the Black community where the idea is supposedly that America’s a racist society….Blacks are bullied a lot. Okay, in the Black community, there’s significantly lower suicide rates than in the White community.”

Half True. It is true that, in the United States, Black people generally have lower suicide rates than White people (over most age ranges, with the exception of the higher suicide rates found among Black children than White children) as you can see from this table of CDC data posted on the American Association of Suicidology website (where rate is defined as number of suicides by group/by the population of the group X 100,000):

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But this does not, as Shapiro suggested, prove that bullying is unrelated to suicide rates. As mentioned above, suicide is an outcome influenced by the interplay of risk and resilience factors. If, hypothetically, one group was bullied in equal amounts as another group, and there were disparate suicide rates, that does not necessarily mean that the group with the higher rate has a particular mental state with comorbidities (as Shapiro characterized being transgender) that accounts for all of the difference. It could be due to a number of possible factors (e.g., being a member of a group that, on average, has less social support to buffer against risk factors like bullying).

Further, racism is evident in various domains (e.g., discrimination in housing, education, healthcare, voting, and the criminal justice system), but bullying may not be one of them. At least one study using a nationally representative sample found that Black youth (19%) reported being bullied at comparable rates to White youth (21%).

5. “In fact, in third world countries, the suicide rate is significantly lower than in first world countries. Suicide actually seems to be a privilege of the upper classes if you actually look at it from a financial perspective. So, the idea that suicidality is directly a result of people like me saying, ‘No, men are not women and women are not men.’ It’s not true.”

Mostly false. I’m not sure that I fully understand the thread through this argument. My best guess, based on the full video context, is that Shapiro proposed that suicide occurs more among people with societal privilege and therefore high suicide attempt rates among transgender people would not be improved if they had more societal privilege? Or that denying the validity of transgender people’s gender identity and bullying do not increase risk for suicide, but having a lot of money does?

There are two claims to fact-check here. First, I’ll focus on the statement about suicide rates in “third world” (developing) vs. “first world” (developed) countries. To evaluate this, I examined the World Health Organization‘s 2016 suicide data by country (units are # of suicide deaths/100,000 people) paired with the World Bank’s 2017 country classification data (high income, upper middle income, lower middle income, low income). There was a lot of variability within the categories (especially in the high income group). For example, the high income group (n = 50) ranged from 0.5/100,000 (Antigua and Barbuda) to 31.90/100,000 (Lithuania). Meanwhile, the low income group (n = 31) ranged from 3.7/100,000 (Malawi) to 11.7/100,000 (Haiti). I conducted an ANOVA on the 174 countries I had data for and found statistically significant differences in the direction that Shapiro asserted. Stats people may have noticed that the assumption of homogeneity of variance was violated and that the groups are unequal sizes. Parallel analyses using a robust (Welch’s) ANOVA and nonparametric (Kruskal-Wallis) testing suggested comparable results.

Chart 1.png

Because Shapiro mostly meant suicide attempts when talking about suicide deaths, I’ll also include results from a study which found, “twelve-month prevalence estimates of suicide ideation, plans, and attempts were 2.0%, 0.6% and 0.3% respectively for developed countries and 2.1%, 0.7% and 0.4% for developing countries.” There were no meaningful differences for suicide attempt rates related to developed/developing status in that study, and contrary to Shapiro’s second claim, they found that lower income was associated with higher levels of suicidal ideation, plans, and attempts in both developing and developed countries. Similarly, a meta-analysis revealed that low (not high) income level was associated with increased risk for death by suicide:

risk in females

suicidemales

In summary, at a broad level (developing vs. developed countries), Shapiro accurately described the pattern of suicide rates. However, when examining the variables with more precision (e.g., at the individual financial status and suicide risk level), the data are inconsistent with his claim that suicide is a “privilege of the upper class.” It is possible that specific societal structures and cultural elements better account for the observed disparities in national suicide rates.

In conclusion, Ben Shapiro argued that he and others should not be pressured into personally or legally recognizing transgender people’s gender identity as valid rather than their assigned sex at birth. One way that he tried to justify those feelings was to make several statements purportedly proving that societal treatment of transgender people has no impact on their suicide risk. Shapiro has every right to have and express his feelings on this issue. However, his feelings don’t change the fact that societal treatment is, according to a lot of studies, related to suicide risk among transgender people.

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Note 1: The widely-watched Shapiro video is from February 19, 2017, and as of May 14, 2018, I see no notation that corrects any of the misinformation in the video or on his website. If you are aware of such corrections, please contact me, and I’ll update the post. 

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Note 2: For more information and resources about suicidal behavior among TGNC people, please see my post about gender dysphoria and suicidality in Laura Jane Grace’s memoir and the links below:

For Accurate Information on this Topic: American Psychological Association

Learn More about the Lived Experiences of TGNC People in Their Own Words: Aydian Dowling, Chaz Bono, ContraPoints, Janet Mock, Jazz Jennings, Laverne Cox, Leelah Alcorn, Live Through This Project, Trans documentary, True Trans documentary series with Laura Jane Grace

Suicide Prevention Resources: American Association of Suicidology, American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, Darcy Jeda Corbitt Foundation, National Suicide Prevention Lifeline, Trans Lifeline, The Trevor Project

Information for Mental Health Professionals about Affirming Psychological Practice With TGNC People: APA Guidelines, A Model for Children & Adolescents

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Thank you to Linda & Keith for helping me figure out how to best fact-check #5.

Gender Dysphoria & Suicidality in Laura Jane Grace’s Memoir

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Laura Jane Grace playing with Against Me! in Fargo, ND in 2017

I’m a big Against Me! fan, and I recently re-read Laura Jane Grace‘s captivating memoir. I loved learning the stories behind the lyrics and catching Grace’s clever references, like when she said that NoFX never had to wait at the end of the longest line at Warped Tour. I grew up in the Florida punk scene during the late 90s/early 00s and enjoyed the nostalgic recollections throughout the book (e.g., making free copies at Kinko’s, reading zines, and going to concert venues like The Edge). I could write a super-long post about the many poignant parts of the book (see below for a picture of all the pages that I marked to revisit later), but there are people who do that professionally, so I’ll leave it to them.
book

Instead, I’ll focus on the angle that I’m more familiar with: discussing mental health research in the context of people’s stories (e.g., 1, 2, 3). Grace identifies as a transgender woman and has described her gender dysphoria as a deeply distressing experience resulting from a misalignment between her self-perception and physical body. Her book opened with her earliest memory of gender dysphoria, which occurred at age 5 while watching Madonna on TV:

Her dirty blond hair was moussed and frizzed to perfection. Her neon and black clothes were ripped and torn to accentuate her curves. Her chunky bracelets and necklaces sparkled and jangled against her arms and neck as she moved to the beat. I reached out my hand and touched her on the screen. That’s me, I thought, clear as day. I wanted to do that. I wanted to be that. 

This sense of wonderment was cut short by confusion. Suddenly I realized that I would never be her, that I could never be her. Madonna was a girl; a confident symbol of femininity, singing and dancing onstage in a short skirt and high heels. I was just a small boy, living in a ranch house on an Army base in Fort Hood, Texas.

My father’s name was Thomas. My uncle’s name was Thomas. My cousin’s name was Thomas. And I was born Thomas James Gabel, the son of a soldier, a West Point graduate who never went to war. That was the name written on my birth certificate, but I never felt that it suited me.

Beginning in childhood and continuing through adulthood, Grace secretly wore women’s clothes (at first, her mother’s and later, clothes she purchased). She felt overwhelming shame about this behavior and tried to stop it many times, but always found herself drawn back to it and the relief it brought her (she referred to these episodes as “binges and purges”). In her youth, she thought she might be gay (though she was mostly attracted to girls), a “pervert,” or that she maybe had schizophrenia. She pled with God, and even the devil, to change her body to match her gender identity.

Grace endured several stressful events throughout her youth, including her parents’ divorce, disapproval from a church she attended, being bullied at school, legal troubles, and an incident where she was assaulted by police officers. Meanwhile, Grace struggled with depression and substance abuse and ultimately dropped out of high school. She started focusing on making her band successful and moved from Naples to Gainesville, Florida, which had a thriving punk scene at the time (shout-out to my friend’s band from that era, FIYA).

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a Le Tigre show that I went to in Gainesville, 2000

While the success of Against Me! brought adventures, fans, and recognition of Grace’s skills and talents, there were also conflicts among band members, record label issues, difficulties in her first marriage, and a backlash from some punk rock purists who thought Against Me! had sold out. She tried to distract herself from the gender dysphoria by channeling her attention into music, drugs, drinking, and working out. She tried repeatedly to accept living as a man and tried to push ideas of living as a woman out of her mind. Grace recalled a particular time on tour when she and her band saw a group of transgender women walking together. She joined in with her bandmates to make fun of them, while secretly wishing she was as brave as them. No one in her life was aware that she was going through these struggles, even though she wrote lyrics about her gender dysphoria in Against Me! songs. In 2007, Grace got married for the second time. The gender dysphoria decreased during certain periods of her marriage, but always returned (including during her wife’s pregnancy with their child, who was born in 2009).

Grace decided that she would come out as a transgender woman in a 2012 Rolling Stone article at the age of 31. After beginning her transition, she felt more authentic and experienced relief from her gender dysphoria. Still, she continued to face challenges. She got divorced and her father stopped talking to her after she disclosed that she was transgender. Through the hardships, Grace continued to speak out about the rights of transgender people, talk openly about mental health issues, make really good music, and inspire many people. That’s my brief summary of her book — but seriously, you should read her entire memoir, which concludes with this lovely moment between Grace and her daughter:

It’s the new issue of Rolling Stone. On the cover is a close-up shot of Madonna. She looks exactly the way I remember when I first saw her at five years old, the same age Evelyn is now. Red lipstick, piercing blue eyes, not a single hair out of place. Her skin is delicate and gorgeous.

“Daddy, who is this?” she asks me.

“That’s Madonna, Evelyn,” I tell her. She’s a musician.”

“Just like you?”

“Just like me.”

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Against Me! playing in Lansing, Michigan in 2018

While I’ve been wanting to write this post since I first read the book, my motivation was renewed after the release of the “trans military ban” memo, which states that “transgender persons with a diagnosis or history of gender dysphoria…are disqualified from military service except under certain limited circumstances.”  The link between gender dysphoria and suicidality was cited as one of the reasons for this decision. Estimates vary across studies, and there are methodological components that should be carefully considered, but the existing research consistently finds an elevated risk for suicidal ideation, suicide attempts, suicide-related events, self-harm, and suicide among transgender and gender-nonconforming (TGNC) people. I will unpack some of what we know about this empirical relationship, but I want make it clear that I agree with the American Psychological Association and the American Medical Association that the memo is discriminatory. It’s worth reading both organizations’ statements in full here and here.

Back to Laura Jane Grace…in a 2017 interview, she referred to herself as “part of” the 41% lifetime suicide attempt rate among TGNC people. That statistic should be interpreted within the context of the methodology (the report acknowledged that the rate might be inflated due to measurement and sample recruitment methods). Data were not collected on the timing of the suicide attempts in relation to transitioning, which was another limitation of the study. Grace attempted suicide ~1.5 years after she began transitioning, and she partially attributed it to a serious, adverse reaction to the hormones she was taking. In a 2016 interview, she described having suicidal thoughts at various points throughout her life, “…while I’ve struggled with gender dysphoria for my whole life, I’ve also struggled with depression. Those aren’t necessarily linked.” In her memoir, she points to a family history of mental health problems that may have contributed to her mood struggles as well.

The American Foundation for Suicide Prevention and the Williams Institute identified the following risk factors for suicide attempts among TGNC people (from the Executive Summary, p.2):

exec summary.png

Another study found that twice as many transgender youth (34%) reported suicidal desire in the previous year as compared to non-transgender youth (19%) and that depression and school-based peer victimization explained part of the empirical relationship between gender identity and suicidal ideation. Here again, it’s important to interpret the findings within the context of the methods (in this case, self-report questionnaires with some limitations were used).

A 2017 study sought to build on existing research by testing a general theory of suicide (the interpersonal-psychological theory of suicidality, IPTS) and the gender minority stress and resilience model (GMSR) among TGNC adults (again, it’s important to look at the study details for full context when interpreting the results). They reported two main findings: 1) GMSR variables (e.g., discrimination, victimization, internalized transphobia, non-affirmation) explained 20% of the variance in suicidal ideation in the sample and 2) IPTS variables (i.e., social disconnection and perceiving oneself as a burden on others) mediated the relationship between GMSR variables (internalized transphobia, negative expectations for the future, and nondisclosure of one’s gender identity) and suicidal ideation, accounting for 54% of the statistical variance in the sample. A study in TGNC youth also found that IPTS variables were correlated to suicidal ideation and suicide attempts, while another found that a GMSR-related variable (being addressed by a chosen name in multiple contexts) was linked to lower depression and suicidality among TGNC youth.

In summary, we need more research to fully understand elevated suicidality risk among TGNC people. The available science suggests that depression, discrimination, victimization, and other structural factors (e.g., difficulty accessing medical care and affirmative mental health practice) disproportionately impact the TGNC community and contribute to suffering, as Grace wrote about in her memoir. For an equitable and just society, we must join with those working to break down these societal barriers. It’s the compassionate and right thing to do.

I’ll conclude with this wisdom from Laura Jane Grace:

Interviewer: Do you ever get tired of being part of people’s learning curve and constantly explaining to people?

Laura Jane Grace: I don’t get tired of it in a way…talking about trans issues, trying to educate people about trans issues — translates to a real world thing that does actually save lives and helps make other people’s lives easier, including my own. That’s what it’s about…humanizing things.

I wanted to keep this post relatively brief, but if you are interested in learning more about any of the ideas presented in it, you can check out some of these links:

Learn More about the Diverse Lived Experiences of TGNC People in Their Own Words: Aydian Dowling, Chaz Bono, ContraPoints, Jazz Jennings, Janet Mock, Laverne Cox, Leelah Alcorn, Live Through This Project, True Trans documentary series with Laura Jane Grace, Trans documentary

Information for Mental Health Professionals about Affirming Psychological Practice With TGNC People: APA Guidelines, A Model for Children & Adolescents

Suicide Prevention Resources: American Association of Suicidology, American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, National Suicide Prevention Lifeline, Trans Lifeline, The Trevor Project, Darcy Jeda Corbitt Foundation

How Can Professors Help Students with Mental Health Concerns?

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This post was co-written with clinical psychology graduate student and Jedi Counsel podcast co-host, Brandon Saxton.

Disclaimer: Policies, procedures, and resources vary by university, so it’s important to check with your own university and to defer to those over our recommendations.mental-2470926_960_720

In the early 1900s, faculty and staff at Princeton University noticed that several students were dropping out of school due to mental health problems. They sought to prevent this by creating the first campus mental health program in 1910. Since then, it has become standard practice to offer counseling along with physical health services on college campuses. For a fascinating overview of this history, we recommend reading this Kraft (2011) article. Here’s a sample excerpt:

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Professors often serve as an initial contact for students with mental health concerns. Some students are unaware of the available resources and reach out to professors to point them in the right direction, while others feel more comfortable checking in with a professor before seeking help from someone they don’t know.

We’ll start with some general guidelines for assisting students when they approach you for help:

  1. Listen to and assess the nature of the problem in a nonjudgmental fashion. Asking about mental health is typically beneficial for people experiencing problems and does not generally have a detrimental effect on people who aren’t experiencing them (e.g., 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7).
  2. Respond with compassion and acknowledge their concerns. This can provide a sense of hope and validation.
  3. Refer them to appropriate services for their needs (more on this below). When in doubt, choose the services that seem most fitting. If it turns out that the student doesn’t need services or requires a different resource, the specialists at the initial referral source will know how to best proceed.

To expand on step #3, we have listed some of the most common scenarios below:

Worry about mental health symptoms: We usually start with recommending the on-campus counseling services for students. Depending on a variety of factors (e.g., the severity of the problem, their insurance coverage), they may also be interested in off-campus recommendations. We typically give them the link for the Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies website to find therapists who use scientifically-informed practices. If you or the student are unsure about whether the student’s issues warrant intervention, you can assure them that the first step in mental health care is to undergo an evaluation to answer that question and then formulate a plan based on the findings. If they are reluctant to go to the counseling center, we will sometimes offer to walk over there with them or tell them that we understand and that those services will be available when they are ready. If appropriate, we also provide students with information for the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline.

Displaying unusual/worrisome behavior: If a student is exhibiting odd or potentially harmful behavior (e.g., their assignments have violent or suicidal content, they are showing up to class intoxicated, they seem disoriented), then you can typically contact a Behavioral Intervention Team on your campus for guidance. Behavioral Intervention Teams are composed of individuals who represent different components of the campus community (e.g., residence life, student affairs, faculty, law enforcement, counseling center, etc.) and provide consultation, advice, and follow-up with students who need it.

Class accommodations request: Sometimes, students will ask for accommodations without the required formal paperwork. In these cases, it’s important to refer the student to the campus counseling center or the disabilities office, so that they can go through a formal assessment process rather than leaving it up to your own discretion. If students tell us about a life circumstance that affected their ability to complete an assignment, and it’s a one- or two-time incident, we’ll typically allow them to make up the work. However, when the request is more long-term in nature or requiring special accommodations that may be unfair to other students, it’s important to defer to the experts in the disabilities office to make the decisions.

Harassment/discrimination: If a student tells you that they have experienced harassment or discrimination, you should take time to listen attentively, sympathize, and then refer them to the office that handles Title IX issues. We strongly recommend visiting your university website for that office, so that you are familiar with the most up-to-date mandated reporting guidelines and the processes for filing complaints. Here again, if you are unsure whether something rises to the level of harassment or discrimination, it’s important (and sometimes mandated) that you report it to the appropriate office so that they can use their specialized training to make a determination (rather than your own judgment).

In summary, we recommend expressing that you care while also recognizing your boundaries as a professor. You should not act as their therapist, but you can help by connecting them with one. Professors have the power to create an educational environment that reduces mental health stigma and increases students’ willingness to seek help when they need it. We try to communicate this to students by showing that we welcome their questions, providing them with mental health resource information in class, announcing mental health-related community events, and treating such topics with care. As a testament to the positive influence a professor can have through these strategies, look at this letter that Dr. Jeffrey Cohen received from one of his students (thanks to Rob Gordon for sharing it).

Please feel free to contact us if you have any questions, concerns, or corrections. We’ll conclude by linking to two informative articles and our podcast episode on the topic, which goes into more detail. Thank you for reading!

  1. Graduate Students Need More Mental Health Support, New Study Highlights by Elisabeth Pain
  2. The Myth of the Ever-More Fragile College Student by Jesse Singal
  3. Graduate Student Mental Health: Lessons from American Economics Departments by Paul Barreira, Matthew Basilico, and Valentin Bolotonyy

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A Note on the Tragedy at Douglas High School

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All school shootings are heartbreaking. The one at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School hits close to home. I grew up in the town neighboring Parkland. I have seen many of my friends from high school express similar sentiments: Douglas was our “rival” high school, but we all got to know each other in middle school and were friends. We hurt for our friends. Most of us still have connections with the area. Our family and friends live there. We can vividly picture the details revealed in the news because we’ve been in those locations. Most of us remember being there without fear that a mass shooting like this could ever occur.

For parents who lost their children in the shooting, this must be an absolute gut-wrenching nightmare. I hear my parent friends saying that they worry about mass shootings when they send their kids off to school. The things that they used to tell themselves to reduce their worry (e.g., we live in a safe town, the school prepares with active shooter drills, the school has security in place, armed resource officers are on campus) start to lose their power when a mass shooting like the one at Douglas happens. The fact that school shootings are statistically rare in an individual risk sense provides little comfort to concerned parents. All children deserve to go to school in safe places, and parents shouldn’t feel like they’re putting their kids in harm’s way simply by sending them to get an education.

For the family, friends, and people directly affected by gun violence of all kinds…no words suffice. I have nothing but compassion, sympathy, and motivation to do my part to address this painful problem. The loss of a child is unfathomable, and I send nothing but love your way. I will conclude with two suggestions for coping, in case they’re helpful to anyone.

Connect

In the face of painful emotions, it can be tempting to withdraw and isolate oneself…to avoid processing or thinking about hurtful realities. While taking time to oneself and breaks from tragic news are components of healthy coping, it’s important to balance that out with taking time to connect with others about your feelings. Interpersonal connections are crucial to good mental and physical health. Communicating with others during stressful times helps to remind us that we’re not alone in our experiences, that we have people who we can depend on, and that there are many kind people out in the world. The American Psychological Association’s press release provides additional resources for coping in the face of this tragedy.

Contribute

This Twitter thread spoke to me. It says that we must act in the face of tragedy 1) to reduce the number of people who are victims in the future and 2) to show our children that we care enough to keep trying. When we take action, it can provide hope in times of despair – for ourselves and for others. Over 10,000 people have already joined a Mobilizing Marjory Stoneman Douglas Facebook group. Over 100 mental health professionals in Florida have said they’re willing to donate time to provide therapy for Douglas students and their families. There is a benefit concert being organized to help victims’ families. There is a fund to help Marjory Stoneman Douglas victims. Students and teachers who survived are courageously speaking out, organizing groups, and planning rallies and marches. People are pulling together to contribute what they can with their diverse resources and talents.

Let’s remember these students and staff and find ways to honor them. Let’s lean on each other for support in the wake of this tragedy.