Mental health practitioners' attitudes towards transgender people: A systematic review of the literature

ABSTRACTBackground: A systematic review was conducted to critically evaluate and synthesize literature investigating mental health practitioners' attitudes towards transgender people.Objective: Three primary objectives were outlined; first, establish whether overall attitudes are positive or negative. Second, explore whether training, education or experience influences attitudes and finally, examine participant demographics in relation to attitude trends.Method: A systematic electronic search was carried out in March 2017 using Medline, PsycINFO, PsycArticles, CINAHL, ASSIA, and Web of Science electronic databases. Manual citation and ancestral searches were conducted on identified papers. Qualitative, quantitative and mixed method studies were eligible for inclusion. A total of 13 papers of mixed quality were identified.Results: Existing literature is limited to cross-sectional, quantitative data and fails to investigate differences between implicit and explicit attitudes. Small to moderate convenience s...