Gender Identity – Better Understanding is Important

Gender identity refers to the personal definition of one's gender - whether they classified as male, female, both, or even no one. It is closely linked with gender role, which is the outward look of what gender identity somebody relates to. This self picture is generally found in youth, before age 5, and is hard to move after that. There are different aspects that affect one's notion of gender identity - among these are biological, social, and environmental issues.

Biological Factors

Both men and women are born with special and unique reproductive and sexual organs, along with different hormonal releases, and they are additional definitions at puberty. Looking similar from the outside, one can generally see if somebody is biologically male or female.

A female doesn’t have a penis and has a vagina, on the other hand a male lacks a vagina but has a penis. These physical features, however, are not always so straightforward - there are many people where the physically distinctive biology is either missing or simply underdeveloped, and therefore biology turns less of a factor. There are also several cases of physical gender disorders, where biology may really be at odds with itself. An easy example of this is a person with the brain design of a man, but has the sexual organs of a female.

However, who modifies their outward biological structure, however, will not be capable to shift their complete gender identity. Many of them have followed surgeries to superficially match a specific sex, but behavioral patterns as well as thinking might go unchanged without more factors being considered. Thus, the biological issues are simply one factor, though a significant one.

Social and Environmental Factors

What is gender identity? There have been a lot of arguments about how much social as well as environmental factors add to a person’s gender identity, and it is a passionately debated issue to this day. This comprised who one's parents were, how they lifted the child, and what kind of social environment as well as culture the child grew up in. A lot to say that, due to the way they were raised, they were taken to adopt or avoid some behaviors and avoid or accept social-based gender stereotypes. Certainly, there is a huge correlation between social and environmental factors and gender identity - children are appropriate to imitate role-models as they develop, and thus imitate the system of beliefs and deeds that their parents have. This is not all the time the case, but often so. Once again, we notice few things and these things cannot account for all of an individual's gender insight, and ultimate gender identity.