A Relational-Cultural Framework for Promoting Healthy Masculinities

We present a conceptual framework for relational interventions focused on helping boys and men navigate harmful socialization occurring in U.S. dominant culture, one which upholds a restrictive image of manhood that gives rise to health problems and social injustice. Drawing from relational-cultural theory, we frame the crises linked to hegemonic masculine socialization as shaped by interpersonal and sociocultural disconnections that keep boys and men in rigid confines of what is expected of "real men," which are detrimental to their well-being and operate to maintain oppression and violence. To work against the relational and societal ways that hegemonic masculinity is taught and reinforced, we view boys' and men's experiences in connection with others and in community as the central context in which healthy masculinities develop. Experiences in growth-fostering relationships of empathy, mutuality, and empowerment can help boys and men reject hegemonic relational dynamics and promote human capacities for vulnerability, connection, and compassion into healthy and flexible ways of being men in the world. We view these relational experiences as critical to prevention, health promotion, and social change efforts at the social, community, and systems levels. To that end, we offer recommendations for interventions to engage boys and men in collectively dismantling hegemonic masculinity and developing healthy masculinities. Public Significance Statement Hegemonic masculinity is linked to negative outcomes for boys' and men's mental, physical, and relational health as well as forms of violence and exerting power over others. This article offers a relational approach to help boys and men resist mainstream ideas of what "real men" should be, describing how relationships and communities can promote healthy ideas about what it means to be a man, with ripple effects for prevention and social change efforts.