Why so many American men feel lost, and what can be done

SALT LAKE CITY — Utah Gov. Spencer Cox called it "critically important" for the state to counter national trends that have left a sizable share of American men disoriented when it comes to their role, purpose and value in society.

Around a third of American men admit to feeling unmoored from anchoring community institutions and unsure of who to go to for help, according to a new Sutherland Institute survey conducted in partnership with Utah's Office of Families.

A significant number of men, around 3 in 10, say they do not feel confident about their place in society and do not have anyone with whom to discuss their mental health or sense of disconnection.

The survey report, "Missing Anchors: How some men drift from health, vocation and purpose," was at the heart of a half-day symposium Thursday in Salt Lake City that brought together national and local experts who share a common concern for the well-being of men and boys and a common goal to find ways to strengthen their ties to family, institutions and even to life itself.

The thread running quietly through the discussions was the need for male role models, whether actual fathers, teachers, men of faith, Scout leaders, coworkers, friends or others willing to befriend and bolster boys and men.

The path pointing young men toward meaning and prosperity is slipping away as the core institutions of marriage, church and civic engagement have eroded, said Richard Reeves, president of the American Institute for Boys and Men, and author of "Of Boys and Men."

He noted drastic downstream effects: Over the past two decades, the male suicide rate has risen rapidly, to four times that of women.

Young men are falling behind girls in school performance and are less likely to go to college. They are more likely to drop out if they do.

The struggles and disconnection are the bad news. The good news, according to Nic Dunn, vice president and senior fellow at Sutherland, which sponsored the symposium, is "most men in Utah and the nation are doing pretty well." They are anchored to jobs, family and a sense of purpose, which are all protective factors. But that a substantial and silent group is not doing OK should concern everyone, he said.

The question is what to do about it.

Struggling for a place in society

While U.S. men self-reported an average mental health score of 75 out of 100, significant subsets reported feeling isolated, directionless and skeptical about society's definition of healthy masculinity.

A full 36% of men nationally said they struggled to understand their place in society. Another 20% said society lacks a clear definition of what healthy masculinity is.

"One of the mistakes we've made over the past couple decades is to blur that line," Cox told Deseret News. "There's so much talk about toxic masculinity, and the downsides of masculinity, that has left men — especially young men — kind of feeling adrift, like, 'Is there something wrong with me?'"

The keys to supporting young men are "thick social institutions" like faith groups and the Scouting America that tie them to positive male role models, who can check in on their lives and hold them accountable to an elevated standard of behavior, Reeves said.

To do that, he suggested also ensuring mental health institutions train providers to deal with male mental health issues and even to increase the percentage of K-12 teachers who are men, which currently stands around 20%. That's a recommendation Cox endorses.

"Being 'unanchored,' to use the language of the current report, is, in some cases, literally fatal, but it's certainly incredibly damaging," Reeves said. "I think there's a space for some civic institutions that take on that gendered role."

One of the primary anchors for men can be fatherhood. But Reeves said socioeconomic changes have raised questions of how to define what it means to be a good father in a world where being the sole economic provider is becoming increasingly rare.

The great hurdle to help America's boys and men, according to Ian Rowe, an educator, founder of Vertex Partnership Academies and senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, is to promote the tools to help males catch up, rather than simply harping on ways that males are falling behind.

Rowe uses the acronym FREE when he talks about his list of tools: family, religion, education and entrepreneurship. This variation on the so-called "success sequence" — highlighting benefits of graduating from high school, getting a job and waiting until after marriage to have kids — gives young men a sense of identity and agency to break cycles of dysfunction.

Instead of overemphasizing failure and crisis, Rowe advised creating "a reverence for the anchor institutions that drive success and upward mobility."

How Utah compares to the nation

On key metrics, Utah stands out. Multiple studies have ranked Utah No. 1 in the nation in terms of upward economic mobility, the number of two-parent households, religious affiliation, church attendance, family unity, charitable giving, volunteer service and neighborhood friendships.

This may at least partially explain why more men in Utah appear to be doing better than those nationwide: 24% of Utah men said they struggle to understand their place in their community, compared to 36% nationally, Sutherland found. While 15% of Utah men said they have no one to talk to about their mental health, the number was 30% nationally.

Higher shares of Utah men express vocational satisfaction and having a sense of meaning (72% vs. 58% nationally). The share of Utah men who reported happiness, life satisfaction and understanding one's life purpose was also roughly 10 percentage points higher than for men nationally.

Sutherland's poll found a strong correlation between positive outlooks and religiosity. Across the country, 65% of men who identified as being religious said they are valuable or needed in society, compared to 47% of nonreligious men. In Utah, 82% of religious men said they understand their life purpose, compared to 56% of those who are not religious.

"Those faith institutions are important in formation. A lot of these are kind of our cheat codes of sorts, to developing the virtues that make us better human beings, better men," Cox said. "It is one place where you can regularly be told that 'this is wrong' and 'this is good.'"

Utah also stood out on another poll result that may be harder to interpret.

While 54% of men nationwide said there is a clear definition of what healthy masculinity looks like in society, just 26% of Utah men agree. Likewise, 61% of men nationwide said there are clear expectations for how a healthy, productive man is supposed to act, compared to 34% of Utah men.

Considering Utah's exceptional religiosity and rate of two-parent families, Utah Lt. Gov. Deidre Henderson told Deseret News it might reflect that Utah men may feel they have a different definition of what it means to be a good man than what is generally accepted by the rest of the country.

Males and mental health

Men face significant barriers to accessing mental health care, including stigma, minimization of symptoms and the fact that mental health issues present differently for men than for women, Dr. Eric Monson, of the Huntsman Mental Health Institute, said during one of the panel discussions.

Signs of suicidality are different, too.

He also emphasized a need for community interventions and policy changes so that men who seek mental health treatment don't lose their jobs.

State Rep. Steve Eliason, R-Sandy, noted that both public education and provider training need to take gender differences into account.

Eliason said that in Utah and the rest of the country, correctional institutions are "far and away the largest mental health institutions," and they don't do a great job because they don't have adequate resources, including enough professional personnel to address mental health.

He said about one-third of inmates in Utah have a serious mental illness. And 98% of inmates will go back into communities that are "ill-equipped" to deal with their challenges and will then wonder "why recidivism and homelessness are so high."

Eliason said that advocating for mental health resources in correctional institutions is vital.

Joe Tuia'ana describes himself as an average Joe, not a clinician. But he founded the I Love You Bro project, an evidence-based men's mental health and suicide prevention group.

He said he'd encountered a man in suicidal crisis and literally "loved him off the edge," then got to know him and his story. "It turns out he had some pretty normal problems — challenges that men face. And we googled some resources for him."

The group was born from seeing how sparse the resources available for men in that situation were, including a dearth of spaces where men felt safe opening up. What started as trying to help one man quickly grew, he said, to 16 weekly support groups.

He noted that it's not helpful when a male struggles to try to force him into a support group. A better approach is, "Tell me about the way you're feeling. I would love to help you, to support you. What is the best way to support you?"

Plenty of work to do

Symposium speakers talked about replacing toxic voices with healthy role models. They shared ideas for helping males develop skills in fatherhood and for being good romantic partners. One aspect of that is developing healthy conflict resolution skills in relationships.

The symposium included panel discussions of vocational meaning and economic mobility and another on finding meaning, responsibility and social connection.

Not all education paths will lead to a college degree, though that's valuable for upward mobility. Mike Kofoed, an economist at University of Tennessee Knoxville/Higher Education Male Achievement, said high schools should include opportunities for students to explore different educational pathways, including technical education and apprenticeships. He, too, touted the value of mentors.

Related:

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Zach Boren, senior vice president of Apprenticeships for America, highlighted that being an apprentice can help a young person to grab a rung on the ladder of success and begin a climb to the middle class or higher. He said that the nation's 700,000 apprentices earn an average of $80,000 a year and have higher lifetime earnings compared to peers who don't pursue education of some sort after high school.

Rich Nye, one of Cox's senior advisers, said Utah has successfully expanded apprenticeships by 63% in the last decade and has worked to remove barriers like liability insurance for those willing to take on the task of training an apprentice.

Per Rowe, in education it's important to create conditions where low-income, stressed communities have the same opportunities as the more privileged areas.

It's not boys vs. girls

Reeves, who is widely recognized for having brought conversations about the well-being of boys and men to the forefront, took pains to emphasize that a focus on boys must not come at the expense of addressing concerns for girls, or recognizing the positive strides women have made.

"It's not a partisan issue; it shouldn't be a divisive issue," Reeves said. "If we want to flourish, we need our boys and men, and our women and girls, to flourish, and anybody that tries to pit those two causes against each other is damaging the debate."

Cox highlighted a favorite study showing Utahns have the least amount of "zero-sum thinking" — the belief that one group's gains must come at another's expense. Too often, Cox and Reeves agreed, this discussion is stunted by political incentives that prevent solutions.

And the power of elevating both boys and girls — in different ways where they are different — is how Henderson chose to bring the symposium home. She highlighted a need to be intentional in addressing the needs of boys and men, but also of girls and women.

"You can see pretty well with one eye," she said, but "you need both eyes open to see the whole picture."

Henderson advocates being intentional with boosting males and intentional with boosting females toward success.

"I think that the worst thing we can do is to believe in a false choice, that one must sacrifice the other, that you can't be intentional about boys and girls, that you can't be intentional about men and women." She added, "We can hold two thoughts at once. We want success for boys and girls, for men and women."

The goal is to adopt policies and practices, she said, "to make sure that everyone has a chance to thrive."

The lieutenant governor harkened back to her earlier elected offices, when there were once "more Dans" in the Senate than there were women (3-2). She didn't, early on, think the imbalance between men and women mattered, but came to realize that it did, "because I had a different life experience than my male colleagues, and I liken it to walking around with one eye open."

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