Unlike womanhood, manhood is widely viewed as a status that is elusive (it must be earned) and tenuous (it must be demonstrated repeatedly through actions). This focus on the structure—rather than the content—of gender roles can shed new light on men’s use of action and physical aggression. Here, we review theory and research connecting manhood, action, and aggression. We interpret men’s aggres...

The authors report 5 studies that demonstrate that manhood, in contrast to womanhood, is seen as a precarious state requiring continual social proof and validation. Because of this precariousness, they argue that men feel especially threatened by challenges to their masculinity. Certain male-typed behaviors, such as physical aggression, may result from this anxiety. Studies 1-3 document a robus...

OBJECTIVE To gain a greater understanding of masculinity and its potential influence on health-improving behavior in midlife and older African American (AA) men. METHODS Forty-nine AA men aged 45-88 years completed in-depth interviews to ascertain their perspectives on masculinity, how masculine identity in this population might be influenced by age and physical activity level, or how it migh...

This article reviews evidence that manhood is seen as a precarious social status that is both difficult to achieve and tenuously held. Compared with womanhood, which is typically viewed as resulting from a natural, permanent, and biological developmental transition, manhood must be earned and maintained through publicly verifiable actions. Because of this, men experience more anxiety over their...

Recently the sport of bodybuilding (fisicoculturismo) premiered in Santiago Atitlán with the opening of its first gym, Gimnasio Atitlán in February of 2003. Since the gym’s debut, bodybuilding has grown significantly in popularity among male Atitecos (word for natives of Santiago), with the gym seeing an average of 70 men a day. In this setting, I investigated notions of health and manhood. Fro...

Precarious manhood beliefs portray manhood, relative to womanhood, as a social status that is hard earn, easy lose, and proven via public action. Here, we present cross-cultural data on brief measure of precarious (the Manhood Beliefs scale [PMB]) covaries meaningfully with other cross-culturally validated gender ideologies country-level indices equality human development. Using from university...

1. In recent years, the field of Asian studies has witnessed the blossoming of research on men and masculinities. Kam Louie took inspiration from traditional Chinese literature and proposed the wén-wu (the warrior and the scholar) typologies of ideal Chinese manhood,[1] which is further complemented by Bret Hinsch's detailed chronological accounts on changing masculinity ideals across Chinese h...