Do Masculine Norms Always Hurt Help-Seeking? The Roles of Self-Stigma and Personal Growth Initiative

The most recent executive summary for the American College Health Association (ACHA, 2023) reported that 67% of college men experienced psychological distress in the past year, yet only 22% sought professional help—compared to 40% of college women. Prior research examining this gender-based disparity identifies adherence to masculine norms and self-stigma as key barriers to help-seeking, with self-stigma mediating this relationship. Given that there has been limited success regarding interventions aimed at altering these stigmatizing beliefs directly, the current study tested Personal Growth Initiative (PGI) as a malleable skillset that may act as a protective and promotive factor between this relationship between masculine norm adherence and these associated outcomes. Specifically, we hypothesized that well-developed PGI skills would act as a protective factor within the relationship between masculine norms and self-stigma, such that this relationship would be weaker for college men with well-developed PGI skills. Additionally, well-developed PGI skills were predicted to act as a promotive factor of more positive attitudes toward professional help-seeking overall. A sample of 396 college men aged 18–25 was recruited through a Texas university’s psychology subject pool via the university’s SONA system. Participants completed self-report measures of masculine norm adherence, PGI, self-stigma, and help-seeking attitudes. Moderated mediation analyses (PROCESS Model 8; Hayes, Version 4) were used to test these hypotheses. The masculine norms of emotional control and self-reliance were associated with more negative attitudes toward seeking help, with self-stigma partially mediating the effect of emotional control and fully mediating the effect of self-reliance. Contrary to hypotheses, we did not find evidence of PGI moderating the relationships between the indirect or direct pathways between either masculine norm and attitudes toward help-seeking. PGI skills were however, found to be a significant promotive factor for attitudes toward seeking professional help and this promotive effect appeared to be fully mediated by self-stigma. These findings indicate that PGI may indirectly support help-seeking by reducing self-stigma, rather than buffering against masculine norms directly. Because PGI is a malleable skillset, interventions focused on developing PGI (e.g., Intentional Growth Training) may provide a more effective and culturally congruent approach to improving help-seeking attitudes among college men than directly confronting masculine ideology. Therefore, outreach programming could utilize PGI skill-building to help college men reframe professional help-seeking as a form of personal development and strength rather than inferiority.