Masculinity research suggests help-seeking attitudes towards mental health concerns conflict with socialized masculine norms such as emotional control and self-reliance (Addis & Mahalik, 2003; Heath, Brenner, Vogel, Lannin, & Strass, 2017). As psychologists continue to find ways to reach out to men, exercise intervention may be the catalyst for men to seek out psychological services. More specifically, boxing training has been shown to increase the sense of self-confidence and character development (Shultz, Stoner, Lambrick, & Lane, 2014; Sokol, 2004). In this study, 24 men engaged in a six-session boxing training program to examine the impact high-intensity exercise has on psychological help-seeking attitudes and psychological distress. Participants reported lower psychological distress, an increase in health behaviors, and high levels of exercise self-efficacy throughout the intervention. Additionally, participants who reported greater adherence to traditional masculine norms endorsed greater psychological distress compared to participants reporting lower adherence to masculine norms. Help-seeking attitudes towards psychological services did not change throughout the boxing program, suggesting men may gain the psychological benefits they seek directly from action-oriented activities.

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Conflict-related sexual violence against men is a largely unrecognized and forgotten perspective in both research and international policies. Reports document that conflict-related sexual violence affects men, yet detailed consideration of the issue remains missing due to the lack of comprehensive research. The existing research is scarce and focuses primarily on the policy perspective or call for increased attention towards recognizing the subject. This study has sought to increase the understanding of the phenomenon through the perspective of mass media. The objective of the study has been to examine how the subject is portrayed by the media, including how male survivors in media describe their own experiences of sexual violence regarding masculine norms and stigma. The study has been conducted as a qualitative desk study by using empirical data from news articles in online newspapers. The study has followed an abductive approach and applied an analytical framework consisting of the two theories Social Stigma and Hegemonic Masculinity. A thematic analysis was used to interpret the empirical data and three main themes were identified. The findings suggest that the subject tends to be portrayed as unusual or as an exceptional phenomenon. The news articles use similar words to describe the subject, such as hidden, silent, ignored, and underreported. The subject is also deeply associated with stigma and masculine norms, both by the survivors and in the articles. The male survivors tend to illustrate how they feel ashamed, humiliated and stigmatized as a result of their experiences. The survivors also reflect upon a sense of loss in their masculine identity and have either avoided speaking about it or been rejected by society due to normative masculine expectations.

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