Mitigating the Harms of Masculinity: A Symposium on the APA Guidelines for Psychological Practice with Boys and Men

In August of 2018, the American Psychological Association (APA) published a new report entitled, APA Guidelines for Psychological Practice with Boys and Men (2018). These Guidelines summarize the extensive scholarship documenting dilemmas associated with masculinity that harm boys’ and men’s lives. They discuss many elements of what is labeled “traditional” masculinity, which requires boys and men to suppress certain feelings and emotions (e.g., sadness and loneliness), limiting their psychosocial development and shaping their behaviors, relationships, and identities. In other words, subscribing to ideologies of conventional or “hegemonic” (i.e., currently and situationally valorized) masculinity (Connell 1995) comes with psychological and interpersonal costs. These constraints can lead to boys’ and men’s lack of empathy for girls and women, as well as for gay and “effeminate” boys, and for LGBTQ+ individuals. At the same time, they operate within a culture where “himpathy” leads people to identify with even poorly behaved white boys and men (Manne 2018). The Guidelines explain, however, that even as men face “costs” of masculinity (see Messner 1997), the expectations of, and privileges associated with, masculinity mean that boys and men are less likely to seek support or treatment for mental health struggles. Ignoring mental health needs indeed becomes an enactment of masculinity itself. As the authors of the report summarize, “compelling evidence exists supporting the need for guidelines for psychologists who provide services to boys and men” (2018, 4). They outline ten separate guidelines for psychologists helping boys and men to seek happiness as well as to establish more intimate and egalitarian relationships.

The Guidelines begin by urging clinical psychologists to understand masculinities as socially and culturally constructed (Guideline 1), and as constructions that look different over the life-course (Guideline 2). They encourage practitioners to recognize how power and privileges associated with masculinity are structured by broader systems of inequality as well as how this inequality deeply harms boys and men and their relationships (Guidelines 3 and 4). They encourage “positive” (i.e., active) involvement from fathers (Guideline 5), and support the role of educational and healthcare institutions in expanding boys’ understanding of their intellectual capacities and occupational potentials (Guideline 6). However, what constitutes “positive” and “healthy” are at times unclear or, in the case of fathering, implicitly presumed to mean present rather than a reimagining of fatherhood beyond providing and playing. The Guidelines also acknowledge and suggest that psychologists work to reduce risk-taking behavior, address trauma that results in boys and men harming themselves and others (Guideline 7), and encourage behaviors that nurture their mental and physical health (Guideline 8). Finally, the report urges that psychologists strive to uphold and support “gender-sensitive psychological services” (Guideline 9), and encourages engaging in “advocacy, prevention, and education” regarding the ways gender inequality impacts boys and men (Guideline 10).

When the Guidelines were released, two types of media attention quickly emerged—support and outrage. These reactions reflect the increasing political polarization in the U.S. and around the world. In the New York Times, Jacey Fortin (2019) was supportive of the report, yet described the Guidelines as “written in academic language” and therefore “not built to go viral.” But they did go viral, despite being written for clinical practitioners. Conservative media outlets uniformly positioned the report as an attack on boys and men. In the National Review, David French (2019) described the Guidelines as an “assault on traditional masculinity,” framing them as “harmful to the millions of young men who seek to be physically and mentally tough, to rise to challenges, and demonstrate leadership under pressure. The assault on traditional masculinity is an assault on their very natures.” The ideas that men should be “tough,” and that their dominance and leadership is part of some natural order, perpetuate the agenda of the men’s rights movement, which is rooted in the fear that white men in particular are being left behind in feminist pursuits of gender equality.

In this symposium on the APA Guidelines, we move beyond fears over the potential feminization of boys and men to share perspectives from some of the scholars whose research and advocacy inform the Guidelines, and whose counseling services and teaching will be shaped by the APA’s stance on masculinity. We invited a diverse collection of psychologists to address the Guidelines, in relation to their own research and clinical practice. In doing so, they help us to better understand just how groundbreaking this report is, as well as how the Guidelines can be further expanded to apply to more sexually, racially, and gender diverse sets of boys and men.

This symposium consists of five separate contributions. Judy Chu and Carol Gilligan highlight human development and psychology as relational and/or relationship-driven, and encourage psychologists to understand how boys’ and men’s development is hindered by the expectations of emotional suppression, “control,” and stoicism. Michael Reichert and Amanda Keddie build on this relational framework by documenting the ways risk and harm have been built into American models of boyhood, and how learning environments can implement “productive pedagogies” to effectively ameliorate these dangers. Daphne Watkins summarizes some of her own research with Black men, focusing on how the Guidelines are a promising route to new horizons for Black men’s mental health. Douglas Knutson and Chloë Goldbach delineate some of the ways “affirmative therapy” can inform practitioners’ use and implementation of the Guidelines for transgender and nonbinary individuals, with a focus on supporting clients’ diverse gender identities and experiences. Lastly, Niobe Way documents the costs of suppressing emotional and relational needs among boys. She shows how boys lose closeness with other boys by adolescence and explicates the attendant consequences. Way calls for a reimagining of boyhood and masculinity toward a healthier world for everyone, a call the new APA Guidelines support.

Although each of the contributions in this symposium focus on key settings, life stages, and populations, they all consider the well-supported finding that psychological harm is associated with conventional masculine norms. And while not exhaustive, these foci reflect some of the diverse issues the Guidelines address, as well as groups and structures that deserve more consideration. Conversations between academics, activists, practitioners, and clients need to continue, including, for instance, how these Guidelines can further address the gendered pressures and trauma of immigration and poverty for boys and men.

While many critics situate the American Psychological Association’s release of these new guidelines as pathologizing masculinity, the essays in this symposium illuminate the inaccuracy of this perception. The Guidelines are the product of a vast body of scholarship over multiple decades that has consistently documented negative mental health, relationship, and behavioral outcomes associated with subscribing to hegemonic ideals of masculinity. Researchers have shown that collections of behaviors associated with risk-taking, violence, self-harm, and emotional suppression are central elements of boys’ and men’s gender socialization. Attempts to approximate culturally “manly” identities and ideals not only hurt boys’ and men’s physical and psychological health, but hurt various gendered others too, resulting in interpersonal, violent dominance, as well as in the enduring valorization of white, heterosexual, and cis masculinity. The Guidelines are thus necessary for better and more research-informed psychological practice, helpful in tackling taken-for-granted inequalities, and, frankly, long overdue.