Findings from a recent survey conducted by the Trevor Project, a nonprofit focused on suicide prevention among LGBTQ+ youth, show that transgender, gay, and nonbinary teens have worse mental health than their peers, and school policies targeting They contribute to their mental health problems.
The data comes from the Trevor Project's 2024 national mental health survey, collected from more than 28,500 LGBTQ+ youth in the United States. Now in its sixth year, the survey offers researchers a comprehensive look at the experiences of LGBTQ+ youth. One bright spot: There is strong evidence that supportive actions by the adults in their lives have a measurable impact on the mental health of LGBTQ+ youth, according to lead researcher Jonah DeChants.
Some of the organization's most recent findings suggest that supportive actions by adults have a measurable impact on the mental health of transgender and non-binary youth, who have recently been subject to restrictive school policies. The data comes from the group's 2024 national mental health survey of more than 28,500 LGBTQ+ youth in the United States.
Now in its sixth year, the survey provides researchers with a wide range of information about the experiences of LGBTQ+ youth. Data not only from the Trevor Project survey and other studies consistently find that LGBTQ+ youth have worse mental health than their peers, and policies targeting them contribute to their mental health problems.
How to show support
One positive finding from the Trevor Project data is that the rate of depression and anxiety reported among LGBTQ+ youth is slightly lower among 18- to 24-year-olds than among 13- to 17-year-olds.
Two falling hypotheses are that LGBTQ+ youth simply have more control over their lives and can express themselves more freely after age 18, DeChants explains, and that mental health generally improves as people mature.
“It is possible to develop better coping mechanisms or seek medical care that starts to work,” DeChants says. “Of course, there are people who experience mental health problems in their 20s, but in general, adolescence is a difficult time to be a person with a brain.”
Transgender and nonbinary youth generally reported higher rates of anxiety and depression than their cisgender peers.
The Trevor Project asked transgender and non-binary youth (TGNB in the graphic) how the people in their lives can show support. The top response was “trust that I know who I am.”
Survey participants said they wanted their parents and caregivers in particular to be kind and speak respectfully of their LGBTQ+ friends and partners, support their gender expression, respect their pronouns, and learn about LGBTQ+ issues.
“Our data on schools and more broadly tells the same story, which is that when LGBT youth have access to people who support them,” DeChants says, “whether it's people in their homes or people at school, like teachers , administrators, counselors – report better mental health and lower risk of suicide.”
The same is true when students attend schools with what DeChants calls affirmative policies, such as having a gender-neutral bathroom or a section of the Genders Alliances of Sexualities.
Only 6 percent of trans and nonbinary youth said their caregivers engaged in all of the supportive behaviors applied to them.
About 60 percent said their caregivers did about half of the supportive actions, and 17 percent said their caregivers did none.
The researchers found that “an increase in a single supportive action by parents and caregivers was associated with a 6 percent lower odds of a suicide attempt in the past year.”
Real world effects
The most recent survey data was collected during what the Trevor Project called a record year for anti-LGBTQ+ policies in public schools.
These policies “have been around to some extent for a long time, but right now they are very much in the zeitgeist. Whether we're talking about bans on trans kids playing sports or accessing gender-specific school facilities,” DeChants says, “those are being proposed and passed in record numbers right now. “So it was very important for us to ask about that in the most recent survey.”
The results revealed that as the number of anti-LGBTQ policies in schools increased, so did the number of LGBTQ+ students report anxiety, depression, suicidal thoughts, and suicide attempts in the past year.
“The fact that those four outcomes are significantly related (to anti-LGBTQ+ policies), to me, indicates how widespread and strong that relationship is in a way that even goes beyond the numbers,” DeChants says.
Nearly a third of survey participants enrolled in school said their school had at least one anti-LGBTQ+ policy. The rate was highest (36 percent) for Native and Indigenous LGBTQ+ students. Students in the southern United States were also more likely to report that their school had at least one anti-LGBTQ+ policy.
Students at schools with anti-LGBTQ+ policies also reported higher rates of discrimination-related bullying, including verbal bullying, physical assaults, and discipline for fighting back bullies.
Capture a diverse sample
DeChants says The Trevor Project wanted to attract as diverse a sample of the LGBTQ+ community as possible, including demographics like race, income and location.
“We still have a lot of work to do, but compared to people who are limited to their local community or don't have the same resources, we have an opportunity to try to capture a broader picture,” he says, “and (a) more nuanced or intersectional, which I think is partly what makes our findings really powerful.”
A small sample size can leave entire racial groups out of an analysis, DeChants explains, because their numbers are too small for comparisons with other groups to yield meaningful results. Having access to a sample of 40 people or fewer, as he did in his previous job as a university researcher, makes his job more difficult, DeChants says.
“That's a major limitation, in some ways, in the field as a whole, and a major contributing factor to our lack of knowledge about people from less representative or less numerically dense groups,” he says.
DeChants says young people want to see themselves reflected in the data. Some have asked the Trevor Project to delve deeper into demographics, perhaps to ask participants about their physical abilities or whether they are on the autism spectrum. They also get requests from advocates who want local data and from people who want to know how to act on what they've learned. Some of those questions have led the Trevor Project to create guides on topics such as supporting mental health of transgender and non-binary youth.
“It's very powerful for young people to say, 'Yes, this actually correlates with better mental health,'” he says. “I think it gives adults and other young people an idea of what they can do, and it gives them data that really shows that those actions are really correlated and that they have an impact.”
