New Categories are not Enough. Rethinking Measurement of Sex and Gender in Social Surveys
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Published
14-10-2025
Laurel Westbrook
Aliya Saperstein
https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0918-3213
Aliya Saperstein
Abstract
This text is a translation by Aina Faus Bertomeu of the paper by Laurel Westbrook and Aliya Saperstein entitled «New Categories are not Enough. Rethinking Measurement of Sex and Gender in Social Surveys» that was published in August 2015 in the journal Gender & Society (volume 29, number 4). The authors reflect on how to measure sex and gender taking as a starting point four US major social surveys that include categories other than binary ones. Although this is a necessary step, the authors argue that there are other conceptualizations and measurements in social research that must be taken into account, such as the equivalent treatment of sex and gender and that attributed by third parties. These assumptions permeate research and limit its potential beyond binarism. Not modifying these assumptions reproduces a dichotomous statistical representation and limits understanding of processes that reproduce social inequality.
How to Cite
Westbrook, L., & Saperstein, A. (2025). New Categories are not Enough. Rethinking Measurement of Sex and Gender in Social Surveys. Papeles De Identidad, 2025(2), fundamental. https://doi.org/10.1387/pceic.27912
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Keywords
survey design, knowledge production, sex, gender, transgender
References
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Bowker, G., y Star, S. (2000). Sorting things out: Classification and its consequences. MIT Press.
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Cavanagh, S. (2010). Queering bathrooms. University of Toronto Press.
Connell, R. (1995). Masculinities. University of California Press.
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Cowan, S. (2005). Gender is no substitute for sex. Feminist Legal Studies, 13, 67-96.
Cruz, T. (2014). Assessing access to care for transgender and gender nonconforming people. Social Science & Medicine, 110, 65-73.
DaCosta, K. (2007). Making multiracials. Stanford University Press.
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Gates, G. (2011). How many people are lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender? The Williams Institute.
GenIUSS Group (2014). Best practices for asking questions to identify transgender and other gender minority respondents on population-based surveys. Williams Institute.
Halberstam, J. (1998). Female masculinity. Duke University Press.
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Harnois, C. (2013). Feminist measures in survey research. Sage.
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Hox, J. (1997). From theoretical concept to survey question. En L. Lyberg, P. Biemer, M. Collins, E. De Leeuw, C. Dippo, N. Schwarz, y D. Trewin (Eds.), Survey measurement and process quality (pp. 47-69). Wiley-Interscience.
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Lucal, B. (1999). What it means to be gendered me. Gender & Society, 13, 781-797.
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Mills, S. (1997). Discourse. Routledge.
Neuendorf, K. (2002). The content analysis guidebook. Sage.
Nicholson, L. (1994). Interpreting gender. Signs, 20, 79-105.
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Schaeffer, N., y Presser, S. (2003). The science of asking questions. Annual Review of Sociology, 29, 65-88.
Schilt, K., y Bratter, J. (2015). From multiracial to transgender? Assessing attitudes toward expanding gender options on the U.S. Census. Transgender Studies Quarterly, 2, 77-100.
Schilt, K., y Westbrook, L. (2009). Doing gender, doing heteronormativity. Gender & Society, 23, 440-464.
Settersten, R. Jr., y Mayer, K. (1997). The measurement of age, age structuring, and the life course. Annual Review of Sociology, 23, 233-261.
Smock, P. (2000). Cohabitation in the United States. Annual Review of Sociology, 26, 1-20.
Snipp, C. M. (2003). Racial measurement in the American census. Annual Review of Sociology,
29, 563-588.
Spade, D. (2011). Normal life: Administrative violence, critical trans politics, and the limits of the law. South End Press.
Spence, J. (2011). Off with the old, on with the new. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 35, 504-509.
Sprague, J. (2005). Feminist methodologies for critical researchers. AltaMira Press.
Stacey, J., y Thorne, B. (1985). The missing feminist revolution in sociology. Social Problems, 32, 301-316.
Titscher, S., Meyer, M., Wodak, R., y Vetter, E. (2000). Methods of text and discourse analysis: In search of meaning. Sage.
Undurraga, R. (2010). How quantitative are feminist research methods textbooks? International Journal of Social Research Methodology, 13, 277-281.
Urla, J. (1993). Cultural politics in an age of statistics. American Ethnologist, 20, 818-843.
Valentine, D. (2007). Imagining transgender. Duke University Press.
West, C., y Zimmerman, D. (1987). Doing gender. Gender & Society, 1, 125-151.
Westbrook, L., y Schilt, K. (2014). Doing gender, determining gender: Transgender people, gender panics, and the maintenance of the sex/gender/sexuality system. Gender & Society, 28, 32-57.
Wickes, R., y Emmison, M. (2007). They are all doing gender but are they all passing? The Sociological Review, 55, 311-330.
Williams, Ch. (2006). Still missing? Comments on the twentieth anniversary of «the missing feminist revolution in sociology. Social Problems, 53, 454-458.
Zerubavel, E. (1996). Lumping and splitting: Notes on social classification. Sociological Forum, 11, 421-433.
Balarajan, M., Gray, M., y Mitchell, M. (2011). Monitoring equality: Developing a gender identity question. Equality and Human Rights Commission.
Bauer, G. R., Hammond, R., Travers, R., Kaay, M., M. Hohenadel, K., y Boyce, M. (2009). «I don’t think this is theoretical; this is our lives»: How erasure impacts health care for transgender people. Journal of the Association of Nurses in AIDS Care, 20, 348-361.
Berger, P., y Luckmann, Th. (1967). The social construction of reality. Doubleday.
Bird, Ch., y Rieker, P. (2008). Gender and health. Cambridge University Press.
Bowker, G., y Star, S. (2000). Sorting things out: Classification and its consequences. MIT Press.
Brewster, K., y Padavic, I. (2000). Change in gender-ideology, 1977-1996. Journal of Marriage and Family, 62, 477-487.
Cavanagh, S. (2010). Queering bathrooms. University of Toronto Press.
Connell, R. (1995). Masculinities. University of California Press.
Constantinople, A. (1973). Masculinity-femininity: An exception to the famous dictum? Psychological Bulletin, 80, 389-407.
Cowan, S. (2005). Gender is no substitute for sex. Feminist Legal Studies, 13, 67-96.
Cruz, T. (2014). Assessing access to care for transgender and gender nonconforming people. Social Science & Medicine, 110, 65-73.
DaCosta, K. (2007). Making multiracials. Stanford University Press.
Fausto-Sterling, A. (2000). Sexing the body. Basic Books.
Garfinkel, H. (1967). Studies in ethnomethodology. Prentice Hall.
Gates, G. (2011). How many people are lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender? The Williams Institute.
GenIUSS Group (2014). Best practices for asking questions to identify transgender and other gender minority respondents on population-based surveys. Williams Institute.
Halberstam, J. (1998). Female masculinity. Duke University Press.
Hammarstrom, A., y Annandale, E. (2012). A conceptual muddle: An empirical analysis of the use of «sex» and «gender» in «gender-specific medicine» journals. PLoS One, 7, e34193.
Harnois, C. (2013). Feminist measures in survey research. Sage.
Harrison, J., Grant, J., y Herman, J. (2011). A gender not listed here. LGBTQ Policy Journal, 2, 13-24.
Hox, J. (1997). From theoretical concept to survey question. En L. Lyberg, P. Biemer, M. Collins, E. De Leeuw, C. Dippo, N. Schwarz, y D. Trewin (Eds.), Survey measurement and process quality (pp. 47-69). Wiley-Interscience.
Human Rights Watch (2011). Human rights violations against trans people in the Netherlands. Human Rights Watch.
Igo, S. (2007). The averaged American. Harvard University Press.
Institute of Medicine (2011). The health of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people. National Academies Press.
Krosnick, J., y Presser, S. (2010). Question and questionnaire design. En P. Marsden y J. Wright (Eds.), Handbook of survey research (pp. 264-313). Emerald Group.
Lorber, J. (1993). Believing is seeing: Biology as ideology. Gender & Society, 7, 568-581.
Lucal, B. (1999). What it means to be gendered me. Gender & Society, 13, 781-797.
Meyerowitz, J. (2002). How sex changed. Harvard University Press.
Mills, S. (1997). Discourse. Routledge.
Neuendorf, K. (2002). The content analysis guidebook. Sage.
Nicholson, L. (1994). Interpreting gender. Signs, 20, 79-105.
Oakley, A. (1998). Gender, methodology and people’s ways of knowing. Sociology, 32, 707-731.
Oakley, A., y Oakley, R. (1979). Sexism in official statistics. En J. Irvine, I. Mills y J. Evans (Eds.), Demystifying social statistics (pp. 172-189). Pluto Press.
Powell, B., Bolzendahl, C., Geist, C., y Carr Steelman, L. (2010). Counted out: Same-sex relations and Americans’ definitions of family. Russell Sage Foundation.
Presser, H. (1998). Decapitating the U.S. Census Bureau’s «head of household». Feminist Economics, 4, 145-158.
Pryzgoda, J., y Chrisler, J. (2000). Definitions of gender and sex. Sex Roles, 43, 553-569.
Randall, S., Coast, E., y Leone, T. (2011). Cultural constructions of the concept of household in sample surveys. Population Studies, 65, 217-229.
Ridgeway, C. (2011). Framed by gender. Oxford University Press.
Rubin, G. (1975). The traffic in women. En R. Reiter (Ed.), Toward an anthropology of women (pp. 157-210). Monthly Review Press.
Saperstein, A. (2012). Capturing complexity in the United States: Which aspects of race matter and when? Ethnic and Racial Studies, 35, 1484-1502.
Saperstein, A., Westbrook, L., y Magliozzi, D. (2015). Gender gradations: Measuring sex and gender diversity in surveys. Population Association of America Annual Meeting, San Diego, May 1.
Schaeffer, N., y Dykema, J. (2011). Questions for surveys. Public Opinion Quarterly, 75, 909-961.
Schaeffer, N., y Presser, S. (2003). The science of asking questions. Annual Review of Sociology, 29, 65-88.
Schilt, K., y Bratter, J. (2015). From multiracial to transgender? Assessing attitudes toward expanding gender options on the U.S. Census. Transgender Studies Quarterly, 2, 77-100.
Schilt, K., y Westbrook, L. (2009). Doing gender, doing heteronormativity. Gender & Society, 23, 440-464.
Settersten, R. Jr., y Mayer, K. (1997). The measurement of age, age structuring, and the life course. Annual Review of Sociology, 23, 233-261.
Smock, P. (2000). Cohabitation in the United States. Annual Review of Sociology, 26, 1-20.
Snipp, C. M. (2003). Racial measurement in the American census. Annual Review of Sociology,
29, 563-588.
Spade, D. (2011). Normal life: Administrative violence, critical trans politics, and the limits of the law. South End Press.
Spence, J. (2011). Off with the old, on with the new. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 35, 504-509.
Sprague, J. (2005). Feminist methodologies for critical researchers. AltaMira Press.
Stacey, J., y Thorne, B. (1985). The missing feminist revolution in sociology. Social Problems, 32, 301-316.
Titscher, S., Meyer, M., Wodak, R., y Vetter, E. (2000). Methods of text and discourse analysis: In search of meaning. Sage.
Undurraga, R. (2010). How quantitative are feminist research methods textbooks? International Journal of Social Research Methodology, 13, 277-281.
Urla, J. (1993). Cultural politics in an age of statistics. American Ethnologist, 20, 818-843.
Valentine, D. (2007). Imagining transgender. Duke University Press.
West, C., y Zimmerman, D. (1987). Doing gender. Gender & Society, 1, 125-151.
Westbrook, L., y Schilt, K. (2014). Doing gender, determining gender: Transgender people, gender panics, and the maintenance of the sex/gender/sexuality system. Gender & Society, 28, 32-57.
Wickes, R., y Emmison, M. (2007). They are all doing gender but are they all passing? The Sociological Review, 55, 311-330.
Williams, Ch. (2006). Still missing? Comments on the twentieth anniversary of «the missing feminist revolution in sociology. Social Problems, 53, 454-458.
Zerubavel, E. (1996). Lumping and splitting: Notes on social classification. Sociological Forum, 11, 421-433.
Section
Fundamentals
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