David Oliver Cauldwell (June 17, 1897 – August 30, 1959) was a prolific and pioneering sexologist, who coined the term transsexual as used in its current definition.
[1][2][3][4][5] Many of his monographs on sex, psychology, or health were published by Emanuel Haldeman-Julius in such forms as Big Blue Books.
[1] In 1949, he used the term transsexual in his essay Psychopathia Transexualis to describe individuals whose sex assigned at birth was different from their gender identity.
Primarily because of this view of gender as plastic, and secondarily because of the limitations of medical science, he regarded sex reassignment surgery as an unacceptable response to transsexualism, and instead advocated that it be treated as a mental disorder.
Despite his belief that transsexuality originated from an "unfavorable childhood environment",[9] he advocated acceptance of homosexuality and transvestism.