A few remarks about terminology (sex, gender, identity) will be followed by a brief review of gender identity construction up till adolescence. The passage from a sort of childhood androgyny to the fullness of sex-specific identity sometimes occurs with some common difficulties; this is also the moment when the possibility of accessing complete and fertile sexuality will confirm or develop sexual orientation. Outside of any problem of sexual development, some adolescents (transsexual) refuse the sex they were born with, which is their biological sex, and request hormone-surgical transformation. Some adolescents have a problem of gender identity related to a problem of sexual development. A « transgender » movement has arisen in our culture, calling gender into question and going so far as to refusing all sexual distinction; this raises questions which are not medical but societal.

Adolescence, 2014, 32, 1, 165-179.