Universit� degli studi di Modena e Reggio Emilia

The 2025 "Pediatria Futura" Award to Unimore PhD Student Viola Trevisani

During the closing ceremony of the 80th National Congress of the Italian Society of Paediatrics, held in Naples, Dr Viola Trevisani, a PhD student at Unimore in the Clinical and Experimental Medicine programme, was awarded first place in the prestigious “Pediatria Futura” competition for a study on Gender Identity in children. The research was conducted by the team led by Professor Lorenzo Iughetti in collaboration with Professor Elena Righi's group.

Gender identity (GI) refers to one’s sense of self as male, female, or outside these traditional categories. It is a multifactorial process that begins in early childhood and is generally established around the age of 3 to 4. The aim of the study was to describe the main characteristics of GI in three-year-old children using a specific questionnaire, and to assess the correlation between GI and both social and biological factors.

To this end, full-term infants and their parents were enrolled at birth. A questionnaire was administered to parents when the children turned three, and anthropometric evaluations, assessments of sexual characteristics, and urinary hormone levels were collected at birth, 3 months, 6 months, and 3 years of age.

The study's findings confirmed that by the age of three, most children are able to identify themselves as male or female in accordance with the sex assigned at birth. It also highlighted that prenatal androgen exposure appears to play a key role in the development of gender identity.

“The study presented by Dr Viola Trevisani and awarded at the National Congress of the Italian Society of Paediatrics is one of the results of the strong collaboration developed in recent years between Paediatrics and Professor Righi’s research group. It lays the groundwork for a better understanding of the endocrinological and environmental mechanisms underlying gender identity development,” commented Professor Lorenzo Iughetti.

The “Pediatria Futura” award, open to young paediatric specialists under the age of 40 who are engaged in research activities, was assigned following a rigorous national selection process. Twelve research projects were shortlisted and presented by the candidates in a plenary session. The judging panel assessed them based on criteria of originality, scientific relevance, and methodological consistency with the stated aims.

Categorie: International - english, Notizie_eng