Attitudes among physicians towards transgender and gender diverse people in Turkey: Relationship with religiousness, political view and conservatism

Abstract

AbstractAccording to several recent studies, physicians in various medical branches have some differences in attitudes towards transgender and gender‐diverse (TGD) persons based on religious or political beliefs. Our study aims to uncover the attitudes of the general physician community in Turkey, which has a youthful profile, regarding TGD individuals. The attitudes towards transgender individuals scale (ATTI) and the general conservatism scale, along with a form that asks about socio‐demographic factors, political beliefs, and level of religion, were administered online to physicians. The ATTI score of physicians (mean = 77.8) is favourable and did not vary among branches. Being female, being close to TGD, having left‐wing views, low conservatism and low religious belief scores were associated with positive attitudes towards TGD individuals. The physician profile’s moderate religious belief and left‐wing views can be interpreted as a country‐specific dynamic and did not prevent the approach from being positive. Despite physicians’ positive attitude towards TGD individuals on a professional level, there is resistance to contacting them in their daily lives. The possibility of the partial contribution of socially desirable response behaviour to positive scores should not be ignored.