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Professional Development Video Presentation

Due: April 27, 2022, by 11:59 PM

You will write a breakdown proposal paper focusing on Social Studies content from your Professional Development Proposal for your colleagues throughout the district.

This paper will be read and developed into a 5-minute professional development video focusing on Social Studies content from your Professional Development Proposal.

Use an outline video platform such as Loom, YouTube, or Vimeo to upload your completed video. You will need to submit the link in course.

Ensure that your classmates can access and view your linked video.

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Investigating the Relationship between the Hormone Exposure and Gender Identity during Adolescence

DeAnna Fleming

Grand Canyon University

Professor Carter

PSY-452

December 2, 2021

Abstract

The adolescence of a major stage of development of the life of a human being. It is during this stage that the transition from childhood to adulthood takes place. During this time, different changes take place in the life of the adolescents that affect their transition. In some cases, the effects have few effects while in other cases, the effects are adverse. One of the effects of this transition stage is the hormone exposure that is related to the gender identity of the adolescents. Teens of different gender go through different hormonal imbalances during this period. In this study, the exposure of effects of exposure to both male and female hormones will be explored and how they affect gender during adolescence period. During this period, the major function of the hormones is to determine the moods, emotions, and impulse reactions of teenagers. The methodology that will be used by the study is descriptive and a sampling technique will be used to determine the sample population. Questionnaires will be used to collect data from the participants.

Introduction

The second stage of human life is puberty stage which comes immediately after adolescence. The stage occurs when a section of the brain that is referred to as the hypothalamus starts to produce a hormone that affects the tests for boys and the ovaries for girls which leads to an increase in the hormones that are responsible for sex. In girls, estrogen is formed while in boys, testosterone is formed. During the adolescence period, teenagers experience many social changes and behaviors (Ristori et al., 2020). One of the behavioral changes is the one related to testosterone. This leads to the development of dominance behavior. It alters the neural transmission of vasopressin that lies within the forebrain circuit. Studies have suggested that testosterone treatment only affects the behavior and gender identity in males during adolescence.

Scholars have also suggested that teen hormones determine the mood swings of teens. These experiences are caused by the fluctuations in estrogen, progesterone, and testosterone which determine the sexual orientations of teenagers. The hormones also play a very significant role in the way teenagers conduct themselves when it comes to matters of dating and sexuality. The purpose of this study is to determine how hormone exposure affects the gender identity of teenagers during adolescence (Hruz, 2020). By doing so, the group of young boys and girls who are going through a transition period will get the necessary support that will help them to cross from childhood to adulthood safely.

Problem statement

During the puberty stage, teens face several changes that lead to major changes to their body systems and behavior. If the teens are not well taken care of, some of them get lost in the whole process. Studies suggest that some of them fail to identify roles that come with them being either male or female. During this period, teenagers need to learn what it entails being either a boy or a girl and be supported to go be positive to the whole transition process. It is there important to ensure that the teens get training and counseling that will enable them to go through the process successfully. This is a normal process, and the teens should not be condemned for behaving abnormally just because of the development process (Moravek, 2019). The study will also ensure that all stakeholders come on board to ensure that the teens have been guaranteed support that will help them take the abnormal behavior and physical changes positively during the adolescence stage.

Hypothesis

The study aims at investigating whether there is a relation between hormone exposure in the uterus and gender identity in adolescents. The other hypothesis that the study aims at testing is whether urine and blood contain hormones that affect gender identity during the adolescence period.

Objectives

1. To investigate what hormone exposure is and how it affects adolescents.

2. To establish the relationship between hormone exposure in the uterus and gender identity in adolescents

3. To investigate how gender identity can be achieved by teens during the adolescence period.

Literature Review

Scholars have suggested that several important psychological characteristics exhibit differences in sexuality which are a result of sex hormones that occur at different periods of development. Sex hormones play a very crucial role in the early developmental stages of teenagers especially when it comes to the differential impacts of prenatal androgens and their effects on the development of gender (Berenbaum, 2018). Another study suggests that prenatal androgens have facilitative characteristics on the activities that are related to the interests of the males, their spatial abilities, but they play very minimal roles in gender identity. A recent study tries to explain and put a lot of emphasis on the psychological mechanisms that determine the effects, and neural substrates of the effects of androgen (Martinez et al., 2020). Other studies have suggested that hormones in conjunction with other social environments are responsible for producing trajectories in terms of gender development and clarification of mechanisms by which androgens are used to affect behavior.

Several studies have been performed on how the behavior and genders of teenagers change during the adolescence period. According to these studies, the behavior changes because of high levels of hormones that are produced in the bodies of teenagers. Scholars have suggested that a lot needs to be done to teenagers during this period to help them to balance their hormones so that their behavior and body changes do not adversely affect their behavior. Most of the studies that have been done in this field have not been in a position to address how the change of behavior can be handled scientifically to ensure that the transition is smooth for the teens (Bastista et al., 2019). It is, therefore, necessary for more studies to be conducted to come up with more recommendations on how this can be done for the interest of teenagers.

Methodology

The methodology for this study will be carried out in two phases. In the first phase, the sample population where the study will be conducted will be identified. The sampling technique will be used to select participants randomly from the whole population who will be involved in the study. The participants need to know that taking part in the study is voluntary and that the data collected will only be for this study. Descriptive research will be adopted in this study. Data will be collected using oral and written interviews. In written interviews, questionnaires will be administered to the participants (Reisman et al., 2019). After filling out the questionnaires, they will be collected and qualitative data analyzed to obtain the quantitative data. Some of the data that will be collected will include age, gender, the time when the hormone exposure effects started being experienced, and how the hormone exposure affects gender identity in adolescents. The quantitative data collected was represented using bar graphs and pie charts. The table below is a sample of the data that will be collected in this study.

From the hypotheses started by the study, the table below shows the number of teenagers whose hormone exposure is likely to enhance their character identity.

Discussion

From the data samples collected above, it is evident that most of the teenagers’ gender identity is greatly determined by hormones exposure during the adolescence period. From the sample that was collected, 80 percent of the boys and 66.7 percent of the girls strongly agreed that their gender identity has greatly been affected by hormones during adolescence. In this regard, it is therefore important that the adolescence period has to be handled with a lot of care because of the very significant role it plays in the transition process from childhood to adulthood.

Conclusion

From the study, it is clear that gender identity takes place during adolescence. During this period, teenagers experience different changes in behavior and their bodies. Some of them grow so big because of hormonal imbalances. It is during this time that boys identify with men and girls identify with women. Their sexual organs fully develop, and they fully become aware of themselves.

References

Batista, R. L., Inacio, M., Arnhold, I. J. P., Gomes, N. L., Faria Jr, J. A. D., de Moraes, D. R., ... & Mendonça, B. B. (2019). Psychosexual aspects, effects of prenatal androgen exposure, and gender change in 46, XY disorders of sex development. The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism, 104(4), 1160-1170.

Berenbaum, S. A. (2018). Evidence needed to understand gender identity: Commentary on Turban & Ehrensaft (2018). Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 59(12), 1244-1247.

Hruz, P. W. (2020). Deficiencies in scientific evidence for medical management of gender dysphoria. The Linacre Quarterly, 87(1), 34-42.

Martinez, C., Rikhi, R., Haque, T., Fazal, A., Kolber, M., Hurwitz, B. E., ... & Brown, T. T. (2020). Gender identity, hormone therapy, and cardiovascular disease risk. Current problems in cardiology, 45(5), 100396.

Moravek, M. B. (2019). Fertility preservation options for transgender and gender-nonconforming individuals. Current Opinion in Obstetrics and Gynecology, 31(3), 170-176.

Reisman, T., Goldstein, Z., & Safer, J. D. (2019). A review of breast development in cisgender women and implications for transgender women. Endocrine Practice, 25(12), 1338-1345.

Ristori, J., Cocchetti, C., Romani, A., Mazzoli, F., Vignozzi, L., Maggi, M., & Fisher, A. D. (2020). Brain sex differences related to gender identity development: Genes or hormones?. International Journal of Molecular Sciences, 21(6), 2123.

Assessment Description

Selecting reliable sources to support research proposals is imperative. Additionally, formatting a paper following APA guidelines is important.

Submit a title page and reference page formatted following APA guidelines.

The reference page should include a minimum of 10 peer-reviewed journal articles that will be used to support the research proposal. The peer-reviewed articles must be published preferably with in the last 7 to 10 years. You may include references for additional scholarly sources to support the research proposal, such as older articles that support a theory the research is based upon or articles from websites associate with credible organizations.

Submit an APA-formatted reference page with 10-15 references. Students are encouraged to use references from previous courses; however, articles must be topic specific to your literature review.

Include an APA-formatted title page with your APA-formatted reference page, which includes the DOIs or persistent links for all articles.

Prepare this assignment according to the guidelines found in the APA Style Guide, located in the Student Success Center.