Sexuality and Gender Diverse Populations

Abstract

This chapter reviews the risk factors and treatment options for sexuality and gender diverse populations.

Sexuality is a person’s sense of themselves as a sexual person and usually reflects their sexual attraction and sexual practice. Heterosexual people are sexually attracted to people of the opposite gender, lesbian women are sexually attracted to other women, gay men are sexually attracted to other men, bisexual people are sexually attracted to people of any gender, and queer people are sexually attracted to people of all genders (queer is also an umbrella term for sexuality and gender diverse people). Evidence from three nationally representative surveys suggests 3.2% of Australian adults report a non-heterosexual identity .

Gender identity means the sense a person has of having a particular gender. Cisgender people identify with the sex they were assigned at birth, transgender people’s gender does not align with the sex they were assigned at birth. Most transgender people identify as either woman/ female or man/male, however people who feel their gender does not align with either female or male, or exclusively with male or female, use the terms non-binary or gender fluid. There is no reliable evidence on the proportion of gender diverse people in Australia; a systematic review of US population-based surveys provided a population estimate of 0.5%.

Establishing an evidence base for patterns of alcohol use and treatment outcomes among sexuality and gender diverse people is challenging. Sexuality and/or gender identity are rarely captured in large surveys and treatment studies, and markers are not included in the Alcohol and Other Drug Treatment Services National Minimum Data Set for all government funded alcohol and other drug treatment specialist services.