This article was originally published in The Gazette.
Hyper-insecurity may have something to do with it.
Discussions about what it means to be a woman or a man, and how women and men are supposed to behave, come up in every historical moment. Ours is no different. In a Gazette column last week (“After Trump’s victory, we can’t ignore the danger of male supremacy,” Nov. 13), Allison Hanes described unease about the increasing prevalence of the masculinist movement in Quebec society. This theme arose from a lecture she attended about gender equality as well as in the Nov. 10 episode of Radio-Canada’s widely watched Tout le monde en parle. Hanes noted that the apparent rise in hyper-masculinity is cause for grave concern.
As researchers who study the factors that affect the social and emotional adjustment of older school-age children, these comments resonate with us. One component of our studies concerns the intersections between gender and well-being. Our studies were conducted at different times during the past few decades. This gives us a unique opportunity to assess historical changes on gender-related issues, including the degree to which children adhere to traditional gender roles as well as whether and how gender is related to well-being and functioning with peers.
Many of our findings are relevant, at least indirectly, to the issues raised by Hanes. The participants in two of our studies were fifth- and sixth-graders in schools in lower-middle-class and upper-middle-class neighbourhoods in Montreal and in a city on Colombia’s Caribbean coast. The studies were conducted in 2001 and 2017. Each of the participants completed several measures, including measures of gender role identity, well-being and social functioning.
We measured historical changes in how much older school-age girls and boys see themselves as aligned with traditional aspects of gender roles, specifically interpersonal sensitivity as a feature of being feminine and assertiveness as a feature of being masculine. Few historical differences were observed. The overall average for the measure of interpersonal sensitivity was the same in the 2001 and 2017 studies. The difference between girls and boys was the same, with girls having higher scores. In contrast, a time-related decrease was observed with the measure of assertiveness. Average scores on this measure were lower in 2017 than in 2001. The difference between boys and girls remained the same.
Perhaps more importantly, historical differences were seen in the associations between the gender role measures and adjustment. At both times, having high scores on sensitivity and assertiveness was associated with well-being. Children who had high scores on both measures, regardless of whether they were a girl or a boy, tended to have positive views of themselves.
Another critical finding is a gender-related historical change in the association between assertiveness and self-perceived social competence. In 2001, this association was significantly stronger for boys than for girls; in 2017, it was stronger for girls than for boys. Strikingly, its strength doubled from 2001 to 2017 for girls. Also, sensitivity — a measure that is higher among girls than boys — was more strongly associated with well-being in the 2017 study than the 2001 study, especially for children from upper-middle-class schools.
What do these findings tell us about the level of forcefulness seen in hyper-masculine men? One finding shows that people who have high scores on assertiveness but not on sensitivity are less likely to have positive views of themselves. Other findings show that children who are high in sensitivity and girls who are high in assertiveness have become increasingly secure in themselves. One can ask if hyper-masculine males feel threatened by sensitive and secure individuals, and by assertive girls who in a previous era showed lower levels of self-certainty.
We know that our studies have limitations. Every study does. It may be, however, that our findings tell us something about what is bugging hyper-masculine guys.
