Socio-economic research using historical data from locations reflecting skewed gender ratios is shedding new light on how masculinity norms develop and the significance of understanding them
The need
Male violence against women is rife, the gender pay-gap persists, and the ‘manosphere’ – promoting anti-feminist and misogynist ideas – is alarmingly taking hold.
At the same time, men are among the groups most at risk of suicide, boys are falling behind at school, and poor mental health is common for boys and men.
There is long history of research about expectations of how men and women behave in relation to each other, and on traditional expectations of women, from sexual practices to work habits, but masculinity norms – collective ideas about how a ‘real’ man should behave – are understudied.
Since women have historically been underrepresented and discriminated against, this skewed focus makes sense – at least on the surface.
But men and women do not live in silos and to properly understand and address gender relations, gender (in)equality, and the harms facing men and women individually, masculinity norms must be rigorously studied too.
According to Associate Professor of Economics Victoria Baranov there has been a “sort of zero-sum mentality, where people think if you focus attention on men and men’s behaviour, it means you're taking something away from women.”
“But things that benefit women benefit men, and things that benefit men can also benefit women.
“We need to think about this because men and women live together. We need to be pragmatic and look at issues from all angles.”
Developing a solution
In response to this imbalance, Associate Professor Baranov and her colleagues have been researching masculinity norms from various vantage points: how they form, what behaviours they predict, the resulting socioeconomic outcomes.
“Our focus became especially clear during the 2017 same-sex marriage referendum where a majority voted ‘yes’ to legalise same-sex marriage, yet there were distinct special patterns where some areas were less in favour than others.
“It got us thinking about the historical determinants of some types of masculinity norms.”
Building on their previous research that argued strict masculinity norms can emerge in response to highly skewed sex ratios, Associate Professor Baranov with colleagues Ralph De Haas, Director of Research at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, and Professor Pauline Grosjean from the University of Sydney School of Economics, used a unique natural experiment to test whether there was a causal link between male-biased sex ratios in the past and the manifestation of masculinity norms today.
“When there are more men, they compete with each other. So historical male-male competition could create behaviors that become entrenched as norms in the present day.”
Data about convicts from the colonial Australian era, which saw more than three men to every woman for over a century, was compared with contemporary census data (where sex ratios have been on parity for over a century).
Evidence showed a verified link: historical counties with male-biased populations had higher rates in the present day of behaviours and trends typically associated with heightened hegemonic or dominance masculinity: bullying in school, crime, male suicide, males in masculine occupations – and lower support for same sex marriage in the referendum.
Expanding on this research, the team, along with Postdoctoral fellow at the University of New South Wales Dr Ieda Matavelli, shifted their focus globally, collecting data from over 70 countries to look at the relationship between masculinity norms, behavior and socioeconomic outcomes.
With a focus on dominance masculinity (behaviors that assert male authority in society over both women and non-conforming men), they looked at a specific set of norms: the importance of winning, violence, help avoidance, control over women, and disdain for homosexuals – and measured adherence to them.
The study showed conforming to these norms is predictive of behaviour.
For example, men who adhere to dominance masculinity (especially the importance of winning) are more likely to take risks and less likely to wear seatbelts while driving.
And while they are more competitive and more likely to want to work extra hours, they also have greater symptoms of depression.
In the political realm, men with a penchant for dominance masculinity also tend toward strongman leadership and populism, over democracy.
Because the study incorporated rich socioeconomic data (from work choices to political attitudes), they could also link adherence to a range of economic, health, and political outcomes.
Professor Baranov says it might sound obvious that conforming to masculinity norms would result in certain behaviours, but this was the first large-scale, cross-cultural, nationally representative evidence of individual men’s adherence to masculinity norms, and it showed a robust pattern.
“We show that a) we can measure masculinity norms, b) they’re predictive of behaviours and c) they’re predictive of behaviours above and beyond those which stem from the traditional set of gender norms usually measured.”
“This last point is particularly significant and a key part of our study.
“To establish a distinction between masculinity norms and gender role norms,we surveyed attitudes on both, revealing no neat correlation.
“Western countries, for example, are more progressive in views about gender roles but fall somewhere in the middle when it comes to adhering to dominance masculinity: less than men in the Middle East and Africa, but more than men in the former socialist bloc of South-Eastern Europe and the Baltics.”
This points to the importance of studying masculinity norms in their own right.
“There’s an assumption that what we already measure via traditional gender norms and economic preference, like competitiveness and risk in men, capture everything we need to know about masculinity norms and how they predict behavior.
“But we show that is not in fact the case.
“There's something specific about masculinity. Which is not just about men versus women, but how men more generally think they should be in control of other men and of themselves.
“Dominance masculinity creates and reinforces a social hierarchy that places masculine men at the top – impacting not only women and sexual minorities, who have historically been oppressed by such norms, but also all men by influencing health, economic, and political outcomes through pressures to conform to specific behaviors.”
And those outcomes are much more nuanced than might be expected – leading to both positives and negatives, and often turning out quite opposite results to traditional views on gender roles.
“Strict adherence to dominance masculinity, for example, correlates positively with economic growth while traditional ideas around gender norms does not.
“For instance more progressive views around gender which broadly accept women in the workforce have a positive impact on economic growth.
“Dominance masculinity is also linked to higher rates of depression and shorter lifespans for men (possibly due to norms such as stoicism which can make coping more difficult. In contrast, norms about gender roles have little bearing on physical and mental health.”
Furthering this research, the recently formed Gender Lab is looking at gender in the workplace, including factors that contribute to the gender gap in pay and advancement in the labour market.
And collaborations with NGOs involved in advocacy around positive masculinity are underway to better understand how certain norms evolve and what causal impact they have on behaviour.
“Here, we’re trying to leverage the work these organisations are doing with programs aimed at changing norms and behaviors, to get a better sense of the exact relationship between them.”
The outcome
The impact of this research is far reaching.
From an academic perspective, the findings make a significant contribution to the field of economics by highlighting that previous literature on gender has largely focused on how norms constrain women, while often ignoring men or assuming their decision-making is unconstrained by gender norms.
“This research deepens our understanding of men's economic, social and political decision-making, thus shedding new light on the underlying drivers of gender inequality,” Associate Professor Baranov says.
And there are strong implications for policy-making.
“By showing that masculinity norms are distinct from gender norms, the research makes a clear case for seriously taking them into account.
“We can't just have policies that overlook the fact there are norms that constrain men,” Associate Professor Baranov says.
“In men's health, for example, if we know men might feel it’s emasculating to get screened for prostate cancer, then we need to think about ways of making it more acceptable.”
It also encourages us to ask: what might be better (or more thoroughly) explained by masculinity that has previously only been looked at through the lens of gender?
Could the gender gap in work contexts be more about men wanting to compete with other men than fitting into a traditional gender role? In attempts to change behaviours which are ‘toxic’ – for both men and women – are we looking in the right places?”
With new evidence, policies and programs can be stronger and more effective.
“What is clear is that masculinity norms cannot be ignored. We need to focus on men – as well as women – because these things affect everyone.”
Researchers/Partners
- Associate Professor Victoria Baranov (Associate Professor in Economics, the University of Melbourne)
- Professor Ralph De Haas (Director of Research at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development)
- Professor Pauline Grosjean (Professor in the School of Economics at UNSW)
- Dr Ieda Matavelli (Postdoctoral fellow at the University of New South Wales)
Further Information
https://cepr.org/voxeu/columns/men
https://fbe.unimelb.edu.au/newsroom/voxtalks-podcast-masculinity-around-the-world
Banner image: Pomona College football team, 1907. Wikimedia Commons.
First published on 30 June 2025.
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