I am interested in another area where a lot of research is done and many papers published and then a lot of spin put on results, so I've learned to always look at the actual data sets and results.
That this is not freely available in the Australian Trans-pathways report is of concern. It doesn't mean that their results aren't valid, but it does not allow independent scrutiny of claimed results and conclusions - it's simply not best practice.
I pursued this with another report, from the UK, that claimed a 34% suicide attempt rate:
-found the footnote relating to the report where they got that number from
-followed the relevant footnote from that report to the original study.
And lo and behold the original question asked about "self harm or suicide attempt", making no attempt to separate the two. However, while the survey authors left the reference to self-harm in the chart, their own summary dropped self-harm and reported this figure as relating only to suicide attempts.
And from that point forwards, that is how it was used - a 34% suicide attempt rate even though the 34% refers to both suicide attempts and self-harm.
So back to this Australian report.
It claims that the suicide attempts are caused by rejection and transphobia. However, we do know from a large body of medical research that the co-morbidity of mental health issues and gender dysphoria is very high and that many of these issues predate their gender dysphoria.
IIRC, 80% or so of transsexuals have co-existing MH issues. For them, depression which then leads to suicide ideation, is in the whole caused by having GD and other pre- or co-existing issues. Indeed many are depressed long before they even come out as trans and would face rejection or transphobia and some even long before they develop gender dysphoria.
But the report just states these things as fact, even though the footnotes lead to studies drawing far more nuanced conclusions and/or concentrate on the entire LGBT community and/or once again make claims not fully supported in the data.
One of these footnotes referred to an Australian study that looked at LGBT people who had committed suicide. It found 38 over a 9 year period, only one of which was trans. A sample size of one deceased individual who could obviously not be interviewed as to the reasons for their depression is simply too small to draw any kind of conclusions.
Another footnote referred to the largest trans mental health survey of adults ever undertaken in Australia. (It was self-selected and based on self-identifying as trans.)
This study didn't even ask about suicide ideation or attempts directly, but concluded nonetheless that because so many trans people were depressed, they must be at an extremely high risk for suicide.
So, 57% were diagnosed with depression (an incredibly high number) and 40% reported self-harming or having suicidal thoughts (again a very high number). Best practice in research is to follow up these responses with actual interviews where researchers typically find that only half of those who claim to have attempted suicide have actually done so. Of course, it's impossible to extrapolate a percentage for suicide attempts, but it has to be a fraction of that 40%.
Whatever that number is, it does not support the Trans-pathways one, which is much much higher (3 in 4 diagnosed with depression, 1 in 2 attempted suicide). This may be explained by the fact that while the former, adult only survey, had 60% male participants, the youth study had 75% female participants. And we do know, again from decades of medical research, that female adolescents have higher rates of suicide ideation.
So, it's far more complicated and nuanced a picture than they present - one which needs looking at much closer and in more detail. But they keep on making these black and white claims about "all trans people" anyway even when it may be an issue affecting females more than males and for reasons other than rejection/transphobia.