conversion therapy

noun

plural conversion therapies

: the use of any of various methods (such as aversive stimulation or religious counseling) in an attempt to change a person's sexual orientation to heterosexual or to change a person's gender identity to correspond to the sex the person was identified as having at birth

Note: Conversion therapy is generally regarded as having no scientific basis and as being both ineffective and harmful.

Conversion therapy is both pointless and painful. At its best, it can inflict considerable psychological damage on a child without changing their sexual orientation or gender identity whatsoever. At its worst, it can lead to suicide …

—Samantha Allen

Momentum has been building in legislative sessions this spring for the bans, which prohibit state-licensed mental health professionals from practicing conversion therapy for anyone under 18.

—Susan Miller

called also reparative therapy

Examples of conversion therapy in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

About half of states ban or offer some protections against conversion therapy, according to Human Rights Campaign. —Alex Golden, Axios, 22 Nov. 2024

The Fort Thomas man, who'd been married to a woman and undergone several rounds of conversion therapy, had recently decided to embrace his LGBTQ identity. —Jolene Almendarez, The Enquirer, 27 Oct. 2024

More than one in 10 respondents also said they had been subjected to conversion therapy, and 20% said they had been threatened with it, both at rates several times higher than their endosex peers. —Samantha Riedel, Them, 24 Oct. 2024

Another bill aimed to remove my daughter and all trans youth from the nondiscrimination law that had passed just a few years earlier; and the final bill sought to repeal the state’s ban on conversion therapy. —Abi Maxwell, People.com, 22 Oct. 2024

Word History

First Known Use

1973, in the meaning defined above