 | This articleneeds morereliable medical references forverification or relies too heavily onprimary sources. Please review the contents of the article andadd the appropriate references if you can. Unsourced or poorly sourced material may be challenged andremoved.Find sources: "Sex assignment" – news ·newspapers ·books ·scholar ·JSTOR(June 2023) |
Sex assignment (also known asgender assignment[a][1][2]) is the discernment of an infant'ssex, typically made at birth based on an examination of the newborn's externalgenitalia by a healthcare provider such as amidwife,nurse, orphysician.[3] In the vast majority of cases (99.95%), sex is assigned unambiguously at birth. However, in about 1 in 2000 births, the baby's genitals may not clearly indicatemale orfemale, necessitating additional diagnostic steps, and deferring sex assignment.[4][5]
In most countries the healthcare provider's determination, along with other details of the birth, is by law recorded on an official document and submitted to the government for later issuance of abirth certificate and for other legal purposes.[6]
The prevalence ofintersex conditions, where a baby's sex characteristics do not conform strictly to typical definitions of male or female, ranges between 0.018% and 1.7%.[7][8][9] While some intersex conditions result ingenital ambiguity (approximately 0.02% to 0.05% of births[4]), others present genitalia that are distinctly male or female, which may delay the recognition of an intersex condition until later in life.[10][11]
When assigning sex to intersex individuals, some healthcare providers may consider the gender identity that most people with a similar intersex condition develop, although such assignments may be revised as the individual matures.[2][12]
The use of surgical or hormonal interventions to reinforce sex assignments in intersex individuals without informed consent is considered a violation of human rights, according to the Office of theUnited Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.[13][2][14][15]
Societally and medically, it is generally assumed that a person's gender identity will align with the sex assigned at birth, making themcisgender. However, for a minority, assigned sex and gender identity do not coincide, leading totransgender identity experiences.
Sex assignment refers to the identification of an infant's sex at birth, typically based on observable physical characteristics. This is also known as gender assignment.[2][16]
In clinical and medical contexts, terms such as "birth-assigned sex" or "birth-assigned gender" are used to describe the sex identified at birth, or sex assigned at birth, or SAAB, while "assigned sex" and "assigned gender" may also refer to any subsequent reassignments, especially common among intersex individuals.
The terminology has evolved across various editions of theDiagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) maintained by theAmerican Psychiatric Association. Initially, the third edition of the DSM referred to "anatomic sex".[17] By the fourth edition in 1994, the term "assigned sex" was introduced, with subsequent editions also using "biological sex" and "natal gender". The latest revision in 2022 streamlined the language to consistently use "sex assignment".[18][2][19]
A 2006 consensus statement on intersex conditions also adopted the terms "assigned sex" and "assigned gender". Sex is assigned as either male or female, leading to specific terms:[12][2][20]
More visible adoption of the terminology of sex assignment has led to public debate and criticism.[24]
There is a consensus in the use of the term "sex assignment" for newborns with intersex conditions;[20] observed chromosomal sex and assigned sex may intentionally differ for medical reasons (based upon predictions of psychosocial and psychosexual health in later life).[25]
| Intersex topics |
|---|
 |
Observation or recognition of an infant's sex may be complicated in the case of intersex infants and children and in cases of early trauma. In such cases, the infant may be assigned male or female, and may receiveintersex surgery to confirm that assignment. These medical interventions have increasingly been seen as ahuman rights violation due to their unnecessary nature and the potential for lifelong complications.[26][27][14]
Cases of trauma include the famousJohn/Joan case, where sexologistJohn Money claimed successful reassignment from male to female of a 17-month-old boy whose penis was destroyed duringcircumcision. However, this claim was later shown to be largely false. The subject,David Reimer, later identified as a man.[28]
The number of births with ambiguous genitals is in the range of 1 in 2,000 to 1 in 4,500 (0.05% to 0.02%).[4] Typical examples would be an unusually prominentclitoris in an otherwise apparently typical girl, or completecryptorchidism in an otherwise apparently typical boy. In most of these cases, a sex is tentatively assigned and the parents told that tests will be performed to confirm the apparent sex. Typical tests in this situation might include a pelvicultrasound to determine the presence of auterus, atestosterone or17α-hydroxyprogesterone level, and/or akaryotype. In some of these cases apediatric endocrinologist is consulted to confirm the tentative sex assignment. The expected assignment is usually confirmed within hours to a few days in these cases.
Some infants are born with enough ambiguity that assignment becomes a more drawn-out process of multiple tests and intensive education of the parents aboutsexual differentiation. In some of these cases, it is clear that the child will face physical difficulties or social stigma as they grow up, and deciding upon the sex of assignment involves weighing the advantages and disadvantages of either assignment. Intersex activists have criticised "normalising" procedures performed on infants and children, who are unable to provide informed consent.[27]
In European societies,Roman law, post-classicalcanon law, and latercommon law, referred to a person's sex as male, female, or "hermaphrodite", with legal rights as male or female depending on the characteristics that appeared most dominant. Under Roman law, a hermaphrodite had to be classed as either male or female.[29] The 12th-centuryDecretum Gratiani states that "Whether a hermaphrodite may witness a testament, depends on which sex prevails".[30][31] The foundation of common law, the 16th CenturyInstitutes of the Lawes of England, described how a hermaphrodite could inherit "either as male or female, according to that kind of sexe which doth prevaile".[32][33] Legal cases where sex assignment was placed in doubthave been described over the centuries.
With the medicalization of intersexuality, criteria for assignment have evolved over the decades, as clinical understanding of biological factors and diagnostic tests have improved, as surgical techniques have changed and potential complications have become clearer, and in response to the outcomes and opinions of adults who have grown up with various intersex conditions.
Before the 1950s, assignment was based almost entirely on the appearance of the external genitalia. Although physicians recognized that there were conditions in which the apparent secondary sexual characteristics could develop contrary to the person's sex, and conditions in which the gonadal sex did not match that of the external genitalia, their ability to understand and diagnose such conditions in infancy was too poor to attempt to predict future development in most cases.
In the 1950s,endocrinologists developed a basic understanding of the major intersex conditions such ascongenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH),androgen insensitivity syndrome, andmixed gonadal dysgenesis. The discovery ofcortisone allowed survival of infants with severe CAH for the first time. New hormone tests and karyotypes allowed more confident diagnosis in infancy and prediction of future development.
Sex assignment became more than choosing a sex of rearing, but also began to include surgical treatment. Undescended testes could be retrieved. A greatly enlarged clitoris could be amputated to the usual size, but attempts to create apenis were unsuccessful.John Money and others controversially believed that children were more likely to develop a gender identity that matched sex of rearing than might be determined by chromosomes, gonads, or hormones. The resulting medical model was termed the "Optimal gender model".[34]
Australian government guidelines published in 2013 stated that "individuals should be given the option to select M (male), F (female) or X (Indeterminate/Intersex/Unspecified)" and that government "[d]epartments and agencies will continue to collect sex and/or gender information to inform service delivery, perform their specific function or to contribute to broader government statistical or administrative purposes."[35]
A 2014 report for the DutchMinistry of Justice and Security allowed that while many gender-specific provisions in legislation no longer existed, sex registration, which had been introduced in 1811, was still required for a number of important state functions: family law, pregnancy protections, gender-segregated facilities, affirmative-action policies, and "a limited number of laws and regulations that are specifically aimed at men or women, such as military service". It also found that a majority of civil servants foresaw problems if official gender identifications were removed expanded beyond male and female. It noted that gender "seems to be increasingly experienced as 'sensitive' personal data, but is not yet protected as such by privacy regulations", and advocated for more flexibility and less official requests for gender identification.[36]
In 2015, Canadian activists petitioned theBritish Columbia Human Rights Tribunal to force the government to stop recording the sex of newborns on birth certificates in order to avoid what complainants called "misgendered birth certificates" which they asserted were harmful to transgender people.[37] In 2021, Canada changed the "sex" designation on the Census survey to "sex at birth" in order to reflect that a small number of Canadians subsequently change their gender.[38]
{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: DOI inactive as of July 2025 (link){{cite book}}: CS1 maint: DOI inactive as of July 2025 (link)| Human rights andlegal issues | | |
|---|---|---|
| Healthcare and biology | ||
| Society and culture | ||
| History and events | ||
| Rights by country | ||
| See also | ||
