Men and masculinity

When a deer feels threatened they will raise their tail to warn other deer. When a wombat feels threatened it will dive headfirst into its tunnel blocking the entrance with its sturdy and largely impregnable backside. When a male peacock is threatened he will fan his tail out in order to make himself look bigger. All animals change their behaviour when threatened and according to a new study when a male human feels his masculinity is threatened then his behaviour changes in very peacock-like ways.

The research from Stanford University began by telling the subjects that the study was aimed at seeing how exertion impacts their decision making. Researchers are compulsive liars. The actual purpose was to see how feeling their masculinity had been threatened would affect men’s subsequent behaviour.

So having lied in the name of science the researchers then had the subjects perform grip strength tests. The “results” were then graphed on a fake bell curves that represented male and female results. The female curve was clearly lower than the male one. Subjects were scored either in the middle of the male curve or the middle of the female curve to suggest that their score was either “average” or “weak”. After seeing their results the subjects were then asked to fill out questionnaires about their height, number of previous relationships, personality traits, and interests in products that were skewed toward either male or female. The questionnaire also contained distracter questions to divert from the real point of the study.

The men who had been given falsely low results on the hand grip test exaggerated their height by an average two centimetres, reported having more romantic relationships, claimed to be more aggressive and athletic, and showed less interest in stereotypically feminine products. Men who thought they had achieved average scores did not exaggerate. It seems then that when a man’s masculinity is threatened he will behave in other ways that emphasise his manliness.

All in all, it shows that men are under strong social pressure to live up to gender stereotypes. We should just be thankful that, despite the old “eats roots and leaves” joke, the human male exerts his masculinity in ways that are more like a peacock than a wombat.