Gender Role Socialization | How Men Learn To Be Men

0:01 Hello and welcome to real men. Feel, this is your host author, coach, and healer. And he Grant, you can learn more about me at the Andy grant.com. Real men, feel exist to encourage men to experience and express all of their emotions, so they can be their authentic selves here in real men, feel we have conversations that most men aren't having, but that all men can benefit from today is no exception. My guest today is dr. Bill to Frank, he's licensed psychologist. Who has worked in schools, hospitals group practices. And College counseling centers and had his own parenting Consulting business. He isnít he wasn't a structure. At Harvard Medical School and is published research in the area of men's gender-role socialization. He is a member of the American Psychological Association and is Division of men and masculinity studies. Welcome to Rome in Fayetteville, Thanks Andy, it's good to be here.

0:51 So let's start just to level the playing field. What is gender-role socialization? Okay. Gender-role socialization is basically the process that all of us go through in terms of learning and getting implicit and explicit messages about what our gender is and what it's supposed to be. Okay? So it could be parents friends wider society and absolutely family school friends, social world, the workforce, the Media community at large great.

1:31 What are some common ways that that men specifically are socialized? Well there's a lot of ways too many tip probably list all of them but what I would say is that it's not just that men are socialized. It's really boys are socialized from very early on and it actually even begins before birth. You know I often point out that you know when you see an expectant you know couple the first question we ask is is it a boy or is it a girl? And why is that? It's so that the family, the parents, the friends will know what color are we going to paint the nursery?

2:14 And are we going to buy blue clothes? If it's a boy or pink clothes, if it's a girl. So, from the very beginning that process starts and it carries on for the rest of our lives. Wow, I never thought of it that really kicks off and it's like, how do we all respond to your impending birth like at and socialization is kicked in. We're so And Lead. I'm so when you grind, I didn't even realize. That's why I'm asking the question. Absolutely, huh? And does socialization, ever stop? Not really it's a lifelong process and if you think about the developmental stages throughout life, you know, we go through all these different stages of what we're kind of dealing with it, any given, you know, stage Early Childhood, adolescence adulthood later adulthood and sort of what the literature kind of suggests is that in late adulthood you know, older age, we tend to kind of disregard those gender-role socialization. I think that's starting to change. I think we're doing that a little bit earlier than we have historically, because of these types of conversations. But historically, it's pretty much a lifelong process until well, late into adulthood Is it difficult for someone to go against the way they've been socialized to behave as a gender?

3:42 It really depends. I would say that in general for males, they're much more prohibitions for kind of, you know, crossing over those gender role expectations. Then it is for females, you know, if you think of, you know, children, you know, if a little girl is playing with trucks or climbing trees or plants, In sports, there tends to be less stigma or repercussions. Then if a boy of the same age as may be playing with dolls, or with dresses or engaging in some stereotypical female activities, there's much more stigma about that. And again, that's starting to change a little bit, but overall there's still more consequences for males to do that than there are for females.

4:31 Is socialization, it's not really good or bad. It just is it's like how it's How we learn and how we survive really absolutely. It just is it's a process we all go through and just like other parts of socialization not just about our gender roles. It can have both positive and negative outcomes and that's something that is important for us to just think about and say okay how are we socializing children? How are we Socializing, you know, young adults and what are the ramifications of that are those? You know, are there potentially positive outcomes or are there potentially negative outcomes.

5:12 It seems to me that people are considering those outcomes more recently then a generation or two ago, is that accurate? Yes, absolutely. I think we're kind of looking at sort of the root causes of some problematic behaviors. Results of things and kind of tracing it back to 0. There's this socialization process there are. You know, there are certain issues that are more problematic for women. There are certain issues that are more problematic for men. So clearly gender plays a role in that and kind of looking at well, why is that? And when did that start and how did that start?

5:53 And that's the whole process of gender-role socialization. So what are a few of the problematic outcomes? Male socialization that you see, well, there's a lot, we could look at, you know, just if we look at some of the statistics, that men are at greater risk for a number of, you know, physical health problems. You know, heart disease, men die by Suicide far more frequently than women, they die from drug overdoses, you know, they're much more violent offenders, you know, in the jails Is in the, you know, justice system.

6:34 So there's a lot of negative consequences that have real life and death kind of results and you know, that's an important thing to look at. Well, why is that? Why is that more of an issue for men? And obviously the reasons for that are multifaceted but you can't deny that. There is a gender-role socialization component to that because again a lot of it has to do with the messages. You're certain behaviors, acceptable for men and not for women while you're some acceptable for women and not for men and it's when they get really restrictive and rigid. But that's when a lot of these problems tend to occur and it is is that the case for any sort of socialization the the more strict to the rules are the the more trouble here is generally, I mean with when there's any kind of rigidity and there can't be some flexibility, you know, it's that black or white thinking.

7:30 If you can't see Shades of Grey, it's going to be a problem. And that's when we have these larger societal issues of Oppression or sexism or racism, all the other isms it tends to be because we get very rigid in our thinking. There's a right way and a wrong way. A few months ago, I had dr. Jared diamond on and he shared some some Global Research on death rates. And from just being male, increase your risk of just Deaf from anything. Absolutely. Men, historically, you know, are bigger Risk Takers. You know, they don't seek, you know, medical help as much, you know, and so, and we die at a younger age than women, you know, on average. So when you kind of factor in all of those components, it places at a greater risk.

8:22 What are some of the beneficial outcomes from gender-role socialization? For men? These days. Sure. And I'm glad you bring that up because there tends to be this, you know, movement. You know, there is the sort of men's rights movement in the 1970s followed by, you know, the women's lib movement and in sort of, you know, more modern times, we're hearing a lot about toxic masculinity and the problems with that, and the Pendulum has kind of shifted so much. People start getting really angry and defensive and saying, oh just being a man everywhere everywhere bashing man and being a man as bad. And we're all supposed to be feminine. We're supposed to be like women and we're not supposed to be men and that's not the case at all.

9:06 There are a lot of positive things that are tied into, you know, traditional gender roles, for men, you know, being successful being competitive leadership. but he's being a protector being a provider, you know, those are all neutral or positive qualities and those are really great things so it's not that you don't want to kind of throw out the baby with the bathwater we want to look at all of the messages and say okay which ones are positive and productive and which ones are problematic and why are we kind of holding on to those and again are we having some rigid thinking about that and can we be a little More flexible. And I think that has certainly changed, you know, in the last generation but there's still some work to be done. And again, it depends on the context where you live, you know, your culture, your race, all the other religious messages, there's a lot of components to that is there one element that is?

10:13 The impact is stronger regarding socialization. Like if your parents say something is that stronger than if you saw it in a movie or is it different for each individual? I would say it's probably different for each individual and depending on the context, you know, because again for example, everybody's families are different, right? So you know the impact of parents in a two-parent home is going to be different than the impact of parents, you know, from a single-parent family or where there's extended family versus, you know, somebody who maybe goes to an all male. Schools such as I did versus co-ed schools. Versus if you're in an all-male institution, that could be, you know, the military are predominantly male or the prison system.

11:05 It different things are going to have different, you know, degrees of impact on the individual. What about the age a child is, is it kind of the oldest messages? Stick the the hardest, and the longest or does that have nothing to do? With it. I think it's a cumulative effect, you know? Because if we're getting these messages from early childhood and they're being really reinforced, you know, as we get into, you know, middle childhood, they're getting reinforced when we're adolescence there being reinforced, when we're young adults, then that's going to have a much more lasting impact. Whereas if we get some of these messages early on, you know, and that kind of diffuses over time because again, our context Is different. Then there's going to be you know, some buffering effect you know, just like with everything you know, we get messages from our family that you know when we're 18 when we go off to college maybe we kind of shed some of those values, some of those beliefs and some of us will keep them, you know. So it really kind of depends on an individual situation and you would mention toxic masculinity Earth earlier. So I wonder if would you share your definition of what? That is?

12:20 Sure. I think it's really. Kind of that rigid adherence to a number of problematic aspects of gender role expectations. And there's a lot of different terms out there, you know, in my research, you know, I was looking at things called gender role conflict, gender-role stress, gender role strain. And basically, it's that internal emotional conflict, that we feel that can really have some negative effects. So if we're thinking about, you know, if I feel like I must Always succeed and compete and win, whether that's on the ball field in the classroom in the workforce. If all I can do is win and I Define my male identity, my manhood, my masculinity, to always winning, that's going to create some problems, you know, if it's the issue of, you know, I can't show emotion because as a man I shouldn't do that. You know, that's going to create problems and we can see that in so many situations.

13:26 We can see how that affects, you know, relationships. We can see how that affects, you know, Parenthood marriage, you know, and then, again, it can have a lot of negative consequences in a lot of way so that if we adhere to that to strictly, you know, that's where it becomes really toxic, as, as does anything, it could be a political view, it could be a religious belief, if we're really kind of rigid, and we can't see another perspective, or Sent you another perspective. That's pretty toxic great. Yeah, because the people that get upset about that, seem to think the term tent, toxic masculinity means masculinity is toxic right? It's just no, it's just on the, on the spectrum of masculinity.

14:07 There's an aspect that is too much. Too strict too rigid. And that can be toxic. Absolutely. Okay. Got it. Beautiful and you mentioned gender role conflict and so that does not mean the genders at war with each other. It's much more the inner Out of socialization. I was taught and actually how I'm feeling or living, right? And, and when there's some conflict about that, if I feel like, well, I'm supposed to succeed, I'm supposed to win, but I'm not getting a 4.0 in college. I'm not winning. I'm a failure as a man, or I'm not making partner at the law firm, so I'm a failure or, you know, I'm not the most competitive Athlete on the field.

14:51 I'm Les. An and that impacts a man's mental health. And we see all sorts of problems with that. Where it leads to again, dysfunctional relationships, it can lead to substance abuse, it can lead to Suicide, so it can be really problematic. What got you interested in this as a field of study and work? It's a good question. Um, so I had known I wanted to be a psychologist you know since I was young kind of always knew you know that's what I was going to do in college. I was going to go to grad school and in grad school you know, in the doctoral program, you know, you got to write a dissertation, you've got to learn to do research and you get paired up with an advisor who's doing research, and then it was almost accidental. I was working with one Professor on one topic of research and that Professor left and took their research program with them.

15:47 So I had to be assigned to a different advisor and it was just sort of happened stance. I got assigned to an advisor who was doing this work in men's gender-role socialization. And so it was an interest of mine, but it was sort of accidental, but it was just, you know, one of those things that everything happens for a reason because that was actually pretty reluctant to do. New research, that wasn't my thing. And in order to do research or at least for myself it has it had to be something. I was interested in because you spend a lot of your life, you're eating drinking breathing, this topic until you defend that dissertation. And so for me, this was a personal topic I could relate to it was something that I was seeing in clinical work and I was also at that time.

16:38 It's, you know, I, you know, had a young son and so the whole thought of what does it mean to have a son? And how do I raise a son? And how do I want to raise him the same way? I was raised or differently, all of those things were kind of happening while this you know was happening in grad school and it just kind of made sense. And so I kind of stuck with that, you know, and pursue that line of research and then I was interested in doing that clinically in my work as well. Was there anything that surprised you in your research? Probably a lot of things just the, you know, the whole field of research and how it's done and what it focuses on. And, you know, it was at a time when there was a lot of focus on.

17:30 For example, there was a psychology of women course, that was being taught in my department, in a lot of departments around the country and that was what you took, if you're interested in gender and I always thought it was interesting. Well, how can there be a psychology of women if there's not a psychology of men course, being offered and part of that was because there wasn't really being research done on that. Because what are the response to that was? Well, all the research, it's on men. So, everything that we're learning is really kind of based on men. And so we needed to focus on women and women's experience of depression, or anxiety, or whatever the case may be. But there wasn't something saying.

18:10 Well, let's look specifically At men. So, you know, when I was in grad school, that was sort of an up-and-coming field, and but there was a lot of kind of push back. You know, if you said you were kind of studying that, you know, so I was kind of surprised it again that sort of reverse sexism in the academic and the research world. How did all that research affect you as a father? A lot, you know, I, you know, for me as As somebody who was training to be a psychologist, and a child psychologist at that time, having, you know, children was like having a child, psych lab 24/7.

18:55 So it was instrumental in my, in my education because, you know, you can read something, you can study, something you can learn about something, but it's really implementing it. And when you see it, you know, as anybody does, you know, raising a child. You're living it and breathing it. It's just a Wild, you know, psychology laboratory and my first two children ended up being male. And so, with this piece of it, it was really pronounce of like, okay, I really need to think about, you know, along with everything else. How am I socializing my son's and how are others socializing them? Because it certainly wasn't just up to me, it wasn't just up to, you know, both parents, it was the extended family. It was their classmates, it was the things that they were watching.

19:42 Incur in the media and and learning that okay. Well, I have a very limited role in this because it's not just up to me, I can do my part, but I, at least wanted to be aware of the messages that they were getting and the same was true. I ended up having a daughter, you know, and, and that was important as well. So it didn't turn into just hyper-vigilant helicopter, dad, met monitoring every message that was received. You'd have to ask them, I certainly hope not. Certainly hope not. I hope there was a good balance. Do it were their conscious changes from the way that you were raised? That that you raised your children? There were as I think there is an every generation.

20:24 I think every generation says well I'm not going to be that type of parent. I'm going to raise my children this other way, this better way. And even if you had these great parents you know I think we think well I'm going to do an even better job and so you know as far as the gender role peace, you know, I remember with My oldest son thinking okay. Well you know he was young and you know we had friends who had kids and they you know some of them had girls and to get them dolls a baby doll and we thought like well there's a lot of you know important things about playing with dolls and learning nurturing skills and so okay well let's let's get you know a baby doll for my son and it was amazing how difficult it was to find a baby doll, that was not in a pink box.

21:12 In the girls, toy section of any toy store that wasn't marketed for girls because at that age you know boys like no, I don't want the pink toy. Whatever it is again, so there's gender-role socialization right there. So it took a long time to kind of find a doll that was sort of, you know, marketed to both genders or particularly to a boy but that was a change that I made like really. My parents would have never bought a baby doll, you know for their son. Again, different generation, you know, different understanding of what this was. So I think there were many things, particularly around what clothing, they would wear, or what toys, they could play with.

21:54 And, you know, my, my oldest son love, you know, bulldozers and construction vehicles, and all of that. And he had a baby doll that he would give a Bottle too. And he's fine and he's fine, he's driving awesome. Is it kind of each generation job to push back at their socialization? Or is it, is it not that that automatic are to me? It seems, like masculine socialization was really static for a number of generations and then started getting challenge. Right, I think I don't know if I would say to push back. I think I would say to it's our responsibility to examine it, examine the messages that we're giving our children and giving men or women in society and asking why are we giving those messages?

22:44 And how is that helpful? How is that productive? Because, again, not everything is toxic. So for those things that are helpful in productive, yeah, we want to continue those things and for the things that are, you know, Active for hurtful or oppressive, in some way. That's when you kind of want to push back and say, well why are we doing this and what if we didn't do that? You know you know obviously you know buying that baby doll for my son didn't do some irreparable harm you know but I think that would have been the fear a generation or so ago. So it's kind of asking ourselves. Why are we doing this? And could we do it differently?

23:24 You know and it's not that with every boy you gotta buy them a dog. All, but it's if they say, I'd like to play with this doll, you know, I, you know, I want to play with this toy and if our answer is no to ask ourselves. Well, why not? It's more. It sounds like it's being willing and trusting to really let your child's choices. Lead the way as opposed to your rigid rules that you might have grown up with right in our, in our own fears because usually those rules are based in some sort of fear. Well, if I allow my child to do this, this bad thing will happen and parents, you know, their primary instinct is to protect their children, you know? So that I think is time, you know, time list that we all want to protect the Next Generation and And we should but I think we've learned over time like okay well you know maybe we don't have to protect them in this way or maybe these other ways we do need to protect the more.

24:20 I mean we have seat belts now that Generations didn't do. So we're always kind of re-examining that question of what we'll keep our kids safe. And do you have specific advice for parents today? That are raising raising boys and they want them to be, you know, the healthiest version of men that they can possibly be Yeah, I think really to just kind of support them and to kind of examine their own gender-role socialization. And again ask those questions of well what served me well and what maybe didn't serve me so well and do I want to kind of pass that on to my child?

25:01 Do I want to give them those same messages as well as again, pay attention to the messages that they're receiving from outside the home. Because again no one pair And you know, has 100% influence on their child and so you can be as Progressive or be as open with gender-role socialization or with anything but to be aware that but they're getting other messages and to communicate with them and talk with them, you know, and have those conversations about, you know, oh, you know why do you want to play with that or why can't you do this or who told you you couldn't do that and what do you? Ink about that.

25:44 And, you know, a lot of times kids get really upset over these things, you know. And so just to kind of listen, you know, and maybe kind of re-correct, they're thinking if they say, well, if I do this, then, you know, that means I'm a girl. Or if I do this, nobody will like me. And to say, well no, actually that's not the case, you know? And in to give them examples and role models of, you know, well, boys can do these things and girls can do those things and both boys and girls. These things you know and I think everything we do, you know teaches them. And I think as I said it starts early on and starts at Birth and I think just the language that we use you know when again we've seen changes in language you know, we use the term firefighter, not fireman anymore, you know, or postal worker or not the mailman.

26:36 And so just kind of using those gender neutral things is very powerful because it gives them the message. Oh, Oh, males could do that but females could do that, you know, and not using terms like a male nurse. It's like well, a nurse has a nurse that kind of implies that the norm is a female nurse, you know. So it's all those subtle communication, you know, things that we do that, send these messages and sometimes unconsciously. So it again, just kind of increase our own awareness. Yeah, I guess it because it sounds like you need a lot of self-awareness to look at your own. Socialization, if you want to differ it for Offspring or family members or, you know, relatives that are younger and looking up to you in some way.

27:23 Absolutely. And again, it's not just, you know, we're not just impacting our children as parents, we're impacting other children. When they come over to our house to play, We're impacting other children when they're in our classroom, we're impacting other males. And females when we're listing a job, Bad, you know, with the language we use with whatever the expectation is, it's again, it's a daily thing that we all play a role in and again, just again having that awareness. Well, why am I choosing to do it that way? Why am I limiting 50 percent of the population from doing this? What would happen if that weren't the case and realize, it probably wouldn't be the end of the world. What are you seeing in your mail clients today? That is rooted in their socialization, their gender socialization, a lot, everything from anxiety depression, again, substance abuse, you know, suicidal, thoughts and behavior. And I would say, the common element of all of those things when there's a gender component is the emotion of Shame and that is a huge.

28:37 Issue, particularly for men, because again, what tends to happen? When males sort of deviate from the expectation, is there's a sense of shame that is less pronounced when females deviate and you take that and you combine that with that expectation that men are strong. Men are independent men, don't seek out help and they hold things in and they don't show emotion and it's like a volcano. He know, you know, it builds and builds until it erupts and oftentimes one of the roughs it's really problematic and that's too late at that time. Do you see shame show up more?

29:22 Because a man sees that they have a history of erupting. Or is it the shame because they fail to stick to that masculine path? That they thought they had to stay on? Yeah, it's the shame that they haven't that there's kind of failed in some way. They haven't lived up to these expectations that they're less of a man and that they feel that others perceive them that way. And so whether it's well, I'm I want to, you know, I work in a College Counseling Center and so it's everything from, you know, the freshmen who comes in and says, well, I'm a business major because that's what my parents expected of me because I'm going to go in the family business or whatever the case may be, but I'm really passionate about art but I don't dare declare an art major because that's not seen as appropriate, you know?

30:15 And I'm not going to make money and that's my job as a man to be a provider. And so I can't do that and they'll stay in a, you know, a major, for four years, where they're miserable and they're not doing well, because they're not interested in it, and then they're coming in because they're depressed, they're anxious. Whatever the case, maybe it's something. It's always a shock to me in that, you know, the male stereotype of being independent and going my own way. If there's such a narrow path that is officially being strictly masculine. And, you know, it Fear from deviating that. So are really afraid all the time. It seems in their attempt to be manly, right? And don't feel comfortable expressing that. So, they're afraid alone.

31:02 And that's where it's really dangerous. Yeah, I agree, who had the biggest impact on you learning what it means to be a man. That's a great question. I think it was a lot of things. A lot of people, a lot of sources I think was my own internal searching. I don't think I had super rigid expectations. You know the thought of being, you know, a psychologist and before that maybe a teacher wasn't, you know, devalue did it wasn't you? No. No. You have to join the military or be a police officer? Serve, you know, do some Macho thing. So there was always that support and it wasn't explicit about, you know, all you don't have to conform to gender roles expectations but it was just supporting, you know what I wanted to do?

31:58 And realizing, you know that, that's okay. So I think by getting that message I felt like oh, okay. Well, I don't have to necessarily follow the path. That maybe I'm seeing other people do or that. I'm hearing what I'm supposed to do, you know? And so I think, you know, and then finding other like-minded people and kind of exploring things. I remember thinking like learning about, oh, you know, men can be teachers and men can be nurses and, you know, females can be police officers. And and I always thought that was, you know, great like oh okay. Well it's not as rigid as I was taught and again, maybe not explicitly but implicitly like, Oh, I thought they were these these rules in these guidelines. But well, that's not always the case and so that I think gave me the freedom to kind of pursue.

32:52 What I was passionate about does did attending an all-male school. Give you a more rigid version of masculinity or more expansive one. It's a great question, you know? Because I've thought about that from time and I had never really had I planned to go to, you know, an all-boys high school. I had, you know, been in coed school up until then and it was just that this really good, you know, college prep school that I went to was an all-boys school, didn't know if I would get in but, you know, did well academically and I got in and I was a little concerned I'm like, well, I don't know what this is going to be like just, you know, because again, all that gender-role stuff of the competitiveness of You know, you're supposed to excel at Sports and this was a very sports-oriented school, I was in playing sports, you know, and just thinking like you know, I'm gonna, you know, I'm gonna have a hard time there, you know I got along well with girls. You know the boys tended to be kind of overly competitive at times and just like okay this is going to be you know do or die and that wasn't my experience and I think because when you just have males Any kind of fills the role, there's the, you know, successful, you know, success-oriented males, the athletic competitive meals, but then you also have more nurturing meals, the fun emails.

34:21 The artistic males, you know, we still had an art program. We had a music program, so those were males as well. So I got to see more of a balance and I think that surprised me because again my image of boys men was skewed. So I didn't think like, oh, there are a boys who like art and there are boys, who are into music and there are boys, who are into, you know, social services and so. So, it was kind of a nice balance for me, surprisingly. So, Billy wonder, if there's if there's one thing that you wish more men knew Hmm, one thing it could be more than one.

35:03 But yeah. I think maybe from my clinical experience and this kind of maybe sums up a lot of what we've been talking about is that I try to give the mail clients. The message that it's okay to ask for help and that's actually a sign of strength, because so many feel that it's a weakness, a sign of weakness and The one message I say is it's really a sign of strength to ask for help, because if that's what keeps you from abusing substances, if that's what keeps you out of jail. If that's what keeps you alive, you know. That's a sign of strength and that's helping your family. That's helping your society.

35:50 And that takes a lot of strength because it's not easy to do that. And again I think more men are getting that. At and feeling more comfortable with that, then they did just a few years ago. But that would maybe be the one takeaway message. I would want men to get awesome. Yeah, I could not agree more. I often say that. Oftentimes, the bravest thing you can do is ask for help. Absolutely. So Bill, what's the best way for people to get in touch with you? Find out more about you or thing that you're up to? Yeah, people can email me. My email address is defrank w at aol.com. Um, that's tefra NCW at AOL.com and I'm always happy to, you know, consult with people around these issues and share readings or research or my clinical experience. Awesome.

36:44 Cool. Thanks for this this wealth of knowledge and this really cursory introduction to gender-role socialization, especially for men, but it's something that everybody's lived and living all the time. Absolutely now, yeah, just raised. That awareness and notice and be willing to question, why do I think that, why do I act that way? Where who taught me that, that was the thing to do. So right, we're always learning. Yeah, indeed. Thanks for joining us, everyone. Wherever you are discovering real men. Feel, please, give us some scribe follow, like the comment, share this with somebody post a review. You can always reach me at real men. Feel at gmail.com. Always glad to hear from you. And until next time, be good to yourself.