Gender Identity:

Gender identity — coined in 1964 by psychiatry professor Robert Stoller and popularized by psychologist John Money — is an innermost concept of self as male, female, a blend of both/neither, or anywhere along the gender spectrum. It begins young. The 2012 book, Introduction to Behavioral Science in Medicine, notes gender identity develops “surprisingly rapidly in the early childhood years and appears to become at least partially irreversible by age  3-4.” Recent evidence corroborates this “durable biological element..” Gender identity is also how people perceive and refer to themselves, correlating or not with their sex assigned at birth. Different identities are: nonbinary (most common term), gender fluid, agender, pangender, genderqueer, two-spirit, and third gender. Also see Gender Expression, Gender Role, and for outdated theories: Gender Essentialism and Social Constructionism