Embodiment beyond transition: Psychometric evaluation of the Experience of Embodiment Scale with transgender women and transfeminine people

Embodiment refers to the experience of living in one's body. Research on transgender peoples' embodiment has almost exclusively focused on gender transition, despite embodiment being relevant to all life stages. The Experience of Embodiment Scale (EES) has been used to measure this concept in cisgender people, but to date, has not been used with transgender women and transfeminine people. The current study evaluated the applicability of the EES with transfeminine people (N = 448) by conducting exploratory factor analysis. EES scores were found to be distributed differently among those early in gender transition and those later in transition. Although slight differences were found in the factor structures between these subgroups, factor structures were similar between the current subsamples and previously-studied cisgender samples. Internal consistency was good for each subscale in both subsamples. Implications for mental health promotion in transfeminine people within research and counselling are discussed.