Working with Men : Progress Report 1998 : What we do
Working With Men's consultancy and research work has increased dramatically over the last two years. Below is a short resume of our major projects, both those completed within the last year and those currently in progress.
Research and Development Projects
Young Men's Mental Health Project This piece of research came out of a concern over the rising numbers of male suicide and widespread acknowledgement of men's difficulties in using mental health services. With funding from Charity Projects UK we carried out a survey of counselling and advice agencies to assess the likely barriers and bridges for young men in accessing help around mental health issues. We spoke to 24 agencies and surveyed 36 young men.
Some of our main findings were :
that internal barriers exist in many young men around help-seeking, and these barriers need to he addressed in the longer term through education settings;
that public education initiatives around young men and mental health would be useful in alerting parents, professional to young men's difficulties;
that project staff need training around the impact of masculinity on young men's mental health;
that new 'points of access' need to he considered as a way of short-cutting some of the barriers young men face in accessing services.
Perceptions Of Men In collaboration with the Early Learning Centre, WWM received funding from Save The Children to help identify whether the rapidly changing roles of men and women are impacting on the development of young children's perceptions of "what a man is". From this study of 62 children (aged 5-7 years) our main findings were:
Children need opportunities to discuss and reflect on gender at an early age. The children we talked to were curious about the differences in men and women's behaviour;
Both boys and girls need to be helped to see the male role more broadly than is currently the case. Women were seen as having a broader range of behaviours and role's than men;
Teachers and other professionals need good quality materials to raise these issues effectively. Most currently available materials are aimed at older children;
Boys need particular help to express their views and ideas about gender;
Understanding the value of flexibility in gender roles is vitally important within the changing social context that children find themselves in;
There is a disadvantage for both boys and girls in there being so few men (teachers, dads, outside speakers) involved in infant and primary education.
Young Men, Risk Taking And Sexual Health South Birmingham Health Promotion commissioned WWM to carry out a review of services and assessment of young men's sexual health needs. Interviews with a range of sexual health agencies and with 94 heterosexual, gay and bisexual young men formed the basis of this project. Some of the major findings were:
Work with young men on risk-taking rather than simply on the risks involved in sex is more likely to open up opportunities for reflection and change;
Most young men are very suspicious of sexual health services. Heterosexual young men particularly emphasised distrust about confidentiality and would only attend if they were personally recommended by mates. Gay young men were more inclined to use services but only if they were already out';
All the young men interviewed found the level and timing of sex education to be inadequate to their needs and too often patronising. Gay young men emphasised the need for sex education to include general information about all sexualities and in a format that avoided individuals having to identifying themselves as gay;
Isolation and lack of support was identified by the gay young men and seen as a source of risk taking behaviour;
Images of 'being a man' impacted on young men's levels of risk- taking. There was a direct link between reduction of risk taking and increased levels of responsibility i.e. young men saw a move from proving manhood through risk-taking to this being reflected in roles and responsibilities (e.g. fatherhood and work in particular);
Many agencies failed to target young men and felt unskilled and lacking in confidence.
Boys and Reading We have been working again with The Equality Learning Centre (care of a grant from The National Year of Reading) on a boys and reading project. We have interviewed 20 four and five-year-olds; 16 seven and eight-year-olds; 16 thirteen and fourteen-year-olds and 20 fathers about: - boys' views on reading and pre-reading activities; 1 older boys reflections on their early reading experience, and their ideas for improvements; - the views of fathers, and fathers and sons together, on barriers to male participation in reading and ways to overcome them.
Main conclusions include:
That gender plays an important part in boys reading choices, so for example, the 4 and 5 year-old boys thought there were "boys books" and "girls books", that adventure, horror, boy characters and 'traditional boy' interests had a barring on boys choices of reading material.
That as boys get older, they read less fiction but often increase their levels of non-fiction reading;
That some boys replace books with magazines, computers and video materials;
Boys who develop difficulties reading in their early school years, too often cover up these problems with behaviour they know will distract teachers from the literacy problems;
There is evidence in our interviews (with both boys and fathers) to suggest that fathers reading habits, and their role in their sons reading (and school activities) can have a substantial impact on boys ability to read, their level of interest and their reading choices.
That particularly the transition from Junior to Secondary School can have an enormous impact on boys reading (concerns about what their mates think; increased levels of school work; other interests - particularly computers and videos - are all factors in this transition). However, this is not a quantity issue (boys appear to read as much as before), but more about what they read.
Young Black Men's Advocacy Project This project was internally funded to assess the feasibility of an advocacy project for young African-Caribbean men. We have carried out a series of discussions with over 100, 16-24 yearold young black men, within voluntary projects and schools.
The envisaged outcomes of this project are:
to provide forum's where young black men can articulate their experiences, needs and aspirations;
to increase our knowledge base about the issues and needs of young black men;
to identify issues that can be taken up by and with young black men;
enough information to determine whether an advocacy project could address, target, reach and involve young black men;
a report detailing the events and discussions with young black men.
This project is expected to be finished in early 1999.
Young Men's Development Project Northern Ireland. We have worked with Youth Action NI for a number of years (our publication 'Young Men Talking' came out of a previous partnership), and we are currently external evaluators to their two year, young men's development project. We have recently completed a 'half-time' report, where the project worker has developed 12 pieces of work with boys from a number of Belfast Communities. The second year will develop these still further and look at health, violence, cross-community work and identity. The final evaluation will be carried out in the Summer of 1999.
The Fatherhood Project During 1997 WWM finished the 2nd stage of our fatherhood project. This stage principally involved:
a needs assessment to determine "points of entry" and curriculum content, for courses in schools and youth settings, and the development of curriculum materials. Preparatory work included a review of current 'parenthood' materials and the drafting of a curriculum. We hoped the courses themselves would give young men the opportunity to reflect on the role of fathers; to consider their own experience of being fathered; to consider gender roles and experience of their knowledge of the needs of children.
Some of our major conclusions from stage 2 were:
Determining points of entry depended on a number of variables including teachers per
perceptions of the kind of learning; how sessions were introduced to young men; general school discipline and time available for sessions.
The variety of variables meant that we concentrated on producing materials which we thought would stimulate and engage young men.
Sometimes process and method were more important to the young men than content.
Once young men were engaged, sessions were good, intimate and often moving. We put this down to a number of factors including the materials, style of delivery and level of interest amongst the young men.
We had to vary style depending on the young men, but we found that exploring attitudes was a vital component, and was valued in part, because of the contrast to usual teaching styles.
Practical exercises were liked, and the more abstract the content the more creative the materials needed to be.
Fatherhood does not stand alone as a topic. Violence, bullying, sexual health and their future were among the other issues seen relevant to the young men.
The third stage has now begun, in which curriculum materials will he tested and developed further and made ready for production as a resource for schools and informal education services. These materials will include a set of posters and a board game.
Young Men's Attitudes To Work Funded by Rowntrees, this project aims to examine young men's experience of and attitudes to work. In particular it will look at:
Increasing our understanding of the mindsets young men may have that may create barriers or bridges to the changing job market;
Identifying strategies for professionals to intervene in young men's lives in relation to their perceptions and approaches to the 'gendered' job market;
Providing background information for the development of a module of exercises, information and packs for use in schools, colleges and other training environments.
This is a major piece of work and is being guided by an advisory group of experts. The project will be completed by the end of October 1998 and published in early 1999.
Youth Clubs UK Over the last year WWM has been providing consultancy to Youth Clubs UK on their "Young Men Talking" project. Workers in five projects have been supported to initiate and develop work with young men, working in a variety of contexts and with different methods. The work on the ground is being complemented by the production of a video resource recording the experiences of workers as they have attempted to target work with young men. The video ("Young Men Talking About Talking") and an accompanying set of posters will be launched by Youth Clubs UK in October 1998. A second phase of the Project is now underway with participating projects developing the work of the first year.
