Raising teen boys who thrive could rely on dodging these harsh alpha rules

It was only after a crisis hit their friendship group that Luke and his male friends began to feel comfortable discussing real emotions openly between them.

A keen footballer who had been to an all-boys school, Luke had noticed that “from the ages of around 14 to 17, a lot of my friends, we all never really showed a lot of emotion to each other [or issues with] a deeper meaning”.

Luke, a keen footballer and coach of younger boys, says as he and his peers have matured and faced challenges such as losing a friend, they are less likely to believe they should behave in a stoic way all the time.Credit: Paul Jeffers

But after the tragic and unexpected death of a boy in their year group who died in his sleep of an aneurysm, the mates began to share more of their real feelings. “A lot of us came around to the fact, during that time, that opening up to each other was perfectly healthy and normal,” says Luke, who is now 18.

Until then, they had been at least in part influenced by expectations that boys conform with understood masculine norms, external toughness first among them. Now with some life experience and maturity, the rules are falling away.

The first Australian study to examine the connection between rigid gender norms and life outcomes among adolescent boys – and how beliefs about masculinity affect their wellbeing and behaviour – has found that boys who are not governed by very limiting ideas about what it means to be masculine are more likely to thrive.

Those who adhere to harsh traditional values about manhood are more likely to harm themselves or other people, engage in risk-taking behaviours and to have problems with drug and alcohol use. They are also less likely to have good mental health.

Jesuit Social Services researchers, whose long-term work to support boys and young men’s wellbeing is well regarded, asked 1401 young people from around Australia aged 14 to 18 about how much they perceived and endorsed stereotypical masculine norms. They measured this against boys’ actions and experiences.

It revealed promising findings about how teen boys see their future. About 85 per cent of boys are optimistic about it “despite the pressures they face”. And almost all boys said they were disturbed by the harassment of women and girls.

Most believe in gender equality, and for most, parents and friends have a greater influence than the online world on their idea of what it is to be a man, which the researchers say will reassure parents and others concerned about the influence of online personalities such as the “money-mad misogynist” Andrew Tate.

‘Almost half agree or strongly agree that no one really knows them well.’

But of concern to the researchers and national academics on The Adolescent Man Box advisory panel were that those who held tightest to ideas such as that boys must have a constant, tough and strong public persona; refrain from sharing feelings with others; distance themselves from anything feminine or “gay”; and “be able to stand up to and dole out teasing and taunting in the peer context” – key pillars of the international The Meanings of Adolescent Masculinity Scale – were more likely to struggle with wellbeing.

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They were also more likely to think teen boys should be the ones to decide what teen girls do during sex, to retaliate when rejected, to have friends who had created nude deepfakes of girls they know, and to think that when a man is violent to his partner, “they probably deserved or provoked it”.

These boys were also more likely to have watched pornography in which a woman is harmed, degraded or had things done to her without consent.

“Notably, many boys who have recently used abusive behaviour have also experienced it recently themselves,” the study found.

Sadly, among boys who most strongly adhere to restrictive values, almost half agree or strongly agree that no one really knows them well.

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“Almost half (47 per cent) of boys with the strongest endorsement of the Adolescent Man Box rules said their online social life is more rewarding than their offline interactions, and 85 per cent had experienced poor mental health symptoms in the past two weeks with many not seeking help,” it found.

Matt Tyler, executive director of The Men’s Project at Jesuit Social Services, said it was encouraging that more boys were “feeling comfortable to show up in ways where they’re expressing vulnerability and seeking help from their mates”. But the idea that boys must always be seen as tough and that they should never back down from a challenge was still pervasive.

Almost half of those surveyed said they thought “boys had it harder than girls” and 44 per cent thought boys always had to seem confident even if they were not and many felt misunderstood.

Tyler said it was notable that girls did not endorse strict, old-school masculine values – contrary to the fallacy promoted by influencers including Tate that only the most alpha males attracted females.

‘Girls don’t want you showing up with this bravado and acting like this big dog: they want you showing up as yourself.’

“Both girls and boys are perceiving these social messages, and girls are saying boys are under pressure to adhere to these ideas … but girls are much more likely to reject these ideas,” Tyler said.

“If you’re an adolescent boy, what you’re being told [in the study] is that girls don’t want you showing up with this bravado and acting like this big dog: they want you showing up as yourself.”

National men and masculinity researcher Professor Michael Flood said that while the research highlighted most adolescents respected women and did not endorse harmful attitudes to them, the figures indicated more education around coercive control was needed.

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That almost one quarter of boys and girls said it was acceptable to send multiple texts, calls and messages when their partner was not responding was worrying, he said. As was that 18 per cent felt it was normal to check constantly on who their partner was communicating with, and 12 per cent said a guy should know where his girlfriend was all the time.

But Flood said it was positive that the study generally showed that “most boys and young men have relatively open-ended, healthy, inclusive models of manhood”.

“What they understand of what it means to be a man involves being able to be emotionally expressive ... share feelings, ask for help and so on, so that is heartening.”

The Adolescent Man Box recommendations include the creation of a national action plan for children and young people who have been victims of violence, and targeted services to support them.

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