By akademiotoelektronik, 02/04/2022

Aufeminin questions new masculinities

Aufeminin (Unify-TF1) has just made public a study* on “new masculinities” which attempts to paint a portrait of “plural men” through sexuality, emotional or even physical criteria. Thus, for 63% of those questioned, there are still a lot of gender stereotypes: 67% say that it is still difficult for a man to have attributes considered feminine, while 50% answer that it is difficult for a man to cry or, at 68%, that it is very difficult to get out of the framework associated with his gender. And young people are not immune to stereotypes: 80% of 18-24 year olds say they have suffered from not being successful professionally, while 73% of them say they have felt that they were not manly enough. In everyday life, according to the study, it is still difficult for a man in the eyes of our current society to ask for help (42%), to campaign for women's rights (41%) or even not wanting to make love (48%). For 86% of respondents, even, society seeks to "put in boxes from an early age, which would be the consequence of education", points out the study. Nevertheless, for 79% of the panel questioned, men are not obliged to be virile, while 77% insist on the fact that “you have to go beyond traditional criteria to define a person's identity”.

For the study, a "radical societal change would be underway" more on the evolution of the "role" of men than on "appearance": 76% of French people affirm that there will be more and more stay-at-home dad while 37% think they will wear makeup one day. Similarly, 86% of them have the impression that identities are becoming “increasingly multiple” today. Be that as it may, for 29% of respondents, questioning the traditional model of masculinity and developing new masculinities is a necessary evolution.

And advertising in all this? If the French are well represented in the cinema (74%) as well as in fiction, series and TV soap operas (73%), it is quite different in advertising where they consider themselves to be 56% under-represented as well as in reality TV shows (43%). More cash, the French think at 81% that the representation of men within society is “extremely stereotyped”, in particular through the images conveyed by the media. 79% of respondents even believe that brands participate "actively" in the dissemination of stereotypes about men through their advertisements, while 75% believe that the men represented in the only advertisements are "very often" stereotyped and admit to 52% that they do not not recognize themselves in the definition of man and woman that society conveys. Therefore, unsurprisingly, 83% of them think that a brand that breaks codes and stereotypes about men is "a modern and in the mood of time ".

Methodology: online study carried out on the Access panel Toluna from August 25 to 31, 2021 among 1,431 French people aged 18-74, representative of the French population in terms of sex, age, CSP, region, size and presence of children( s) at home.