Performing masculinity, influencing health: a qualitative mixed-methods study of young Spanish men

Abstract

Background

The literature shows how gender mandates contribute to differences in exposure and vulnerability to certain health risk factors. This paper presents the results of a study developed in the south of Spain, where research aimed at understanding men from a gender perspective is still limited.

Objective

The aim of this paper is to explore the lay perceptions and meanings ascribed to the idea of masculinity, identifying ways in which gender displays are related to health.

Design

The study is based on a mixed-methods data collection strategy typical of qualitative research. We performed a qualitative content analysis focused on manifest and latent content.

Results

Our analysis showed that the relationship between masculinity and health was mainly defined with regard to behavioural explanations with an evident performative meaning. With regard to issues such as driving, the use of recreational drugs, aggressive behaviour, sexuality, and body image, important connections were established between manhood acts and health outcomes. Different ways of understanding and performing the male identity also emerged from the results. The findings revealed the implications of these aspects in the processes of change in the identity codes of men and women.

Conclusions

The study provides insights into how the category ‘man’ is highly dependent on collective practices and performative acts. Consideration of how males perform manhood acts might be required in guidance on the development of programmes and policies aimed at addressing gender inequalities in health in a particular local context.

• gender
• masculinity
• men's health
• young men
• social theory
• health inequalities
• qualitative research

Acknowledgements

We owe our deepest gratitude to prof. dr hab. Beata Tobiasz Adamczy (Jagiellonian University Medical College, Krakow, Poland) and to prof. Dr. José Miguel Morales Asencio (Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Malaga, Malaga, Spain) for their comments on the conceptual basis of this research. The authors are also grateful for all the useful comments and suggestions received on earlier drafts of this paper by the anonymous reviewers of the journal.

Conflict of interest and funding

The authors declare that they do not have any competing interests. This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors. However, we had the opportunity to write this paper with the financial support from the European Regional Development Fund (FEDER) and the Andalusian Government's Economy, Innovation and Science Department (Exp P08-CTS-4321).

Notes

¹ Botellón refers to a social phenomenon that has become popular in public spaces in Spain since the end of the twentieth century. This consists of mass meetings of young people, mainly to chat while consuming some type of drink (55).