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Recent headlines such as \u201cMen, Who Needs Them?\u201d and \u201cWhy Fathers Really Matter\u201d showcase a growing debate about the importance of including men in discussions of gender inequality. Two new studies from Gender & Society<\/i><\/a> turn attention to areas in which men have long been ignored: at home, in the study of conception, pregnancy and childbirth<\/a>, and at work, in the caregiving professions<\/a>\u2014particularly nursing. New research demonstrates under what conditions men\u2019s contributions are slowly becoming more visible and what the benefits are (and can be).<\/p>\n Reproduction: Let\u2019s start at the beginning\u2026or before the beginning, before conception<\/b><\/p>\n In the Gender & Society <\/i>study, \u201cMore and Less than Equal: How Men Factor in the Reproductive Equation<\/a>,\u201d Yale and Princeton University researchers uncovered widely varying views of men\u2019s contributions to reproduction. Clinicians and scientists perceive men as incredibly<\/i> important when it comes to conception; equally<\/i> important to women when it comes to genetics; and incredibly unimportant<\/i> when it comes to pregnancy.\u00a0 Even now in the 2nd<\/sup> decade of the 21st<\/sup> century, basic information about how men\u2019s own health status matters for reproductive outcomes, such as birth defects, is lacking.<\/p>\n About the study. <\/i>Sociologists Rene Almeling<\/a> (Yale) and Miranda Waggoner<\/a> (Princeton) brought together their respective studies of professionals involved with sperm banks and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention\u2019s (CDC\u2019s) Preconception Health and Health Care Initiative (PHHCI). The sample includes data from Waggoner\u2019s interviews with 57 experts involved with the CDC\u2019s Initiative and from Almeling\u2019s interviews with 18 people involved with sperm banks, including founders of sperm donation programs, clinicians, researchers, and staffers from four sperm banks. The investigators recognized that sperm banks are a unique site for pre-conception practices, complementing the PHHCI.<\/p>\n Men left out. <\/i>The standard of care in preconception health is to ask \u201cevery woman, every visit\u201d about her health and fertility intentions, but preconception researchers interviewed for this study believed it was not \u201cfeasible\u201d to ask such questions of men. Despite giving lip service to the idea that \u201cmen are equally important\u201d in reproduction, Almeling and Waggoner\u2019s interviewees admitted that men\u2019s contributions are \u201csometimes left out of the discussion.\u201d In a comprehensive analysis of research on preconception care, the study reported that a majority of journal articles did not discuss men at all or mentioned them only briefly. A striking example was in the introduction to an issue of the American Journal of Obstetrics & Gynecology <\/i>(AJOG<\/i>) on preconception health. In it, the AJOG <\/i>authors <\/i>discussed 84 different risk factors and components of preconception care. Rather than including men in categories such as alcohol or illicit drug use, they were segregated. This means that everything pertaining to men was addressed in a single catch-all category at the end labeled \u201cmen,\u201d report Almeling and Waggoner.<\/p>\n Why does it matter?<\/i> Almeling and Waggoner explain that medical knowledge about reproduction matters, not only for men and their children, but also for how we as a society think about reproductive responsibility. An important step is making sure that men\u2019s contributions to reproduction\u2014not only to conception but to successful, healthy pregnancies–are observed, tested, investigated and discussed.<\/p>\n Calling on the Affordable Care Act. <\/b><\/i>The authors note that paying attention to how reproductive equations influence policy can suggest new and different avenues for improving public health.\u00a0 Specifically, they point to the Affordable Care Act, which stipulates that women<\/i> with private insurance are no longer required to pay a co-payment for a preconception health appointment.\u00a0 \u201cExcluding men from such coverage continues to obscure their role in reproduction,\u201d argue Almeling and Waggoner.<\/p>\n Invisibility Continued: New Research on Nursing<\/b><\/p>\n One way of improving public health and men\u2019s involvement in healthy families would be to recruit more men into nursing, so that men\u2019s experiences, concerns, and values are more visible among the front line providers of family care. Yet only seven percent of the nurses in the United States are men, as discussed in a new study, just released online at Gender & Society<\/i>.<\/p>\n In her Gender & Society <\/i>article, \u201cRecruiting Men, Constructing Manhood: How Health Care Organizations Mobilize Masculinities as Nursing Recruitment Strategy<\/a>,\u201d\u00a0 Marci Cottingham<\/a>, a postdoctoral fellow at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill\u2019s Department of Social Medicine, discusses ways that health care organizations attempt to overcome the disconnect between \u201ccaring\u201d \u2013 defined as the feminine sphere of nurses — and \u201ccuring\u201d \u2013 defined as the masculine sphere of doctors.<\/p>\n Cottingham\u2019s unique study examined the recruitment messages of healthcare organizations, including the American Assembly for Men in Nursing (AAMN). She conducted a systematic, in-depth analysis of 32 videos, brochures, and posters, as well as 286 pages of text from campaign reports, nursing webpages, and newsletters. A total of 124 men were featured in these materials. These materials included a YouTube channel<\/a> dedicated to recruiting men into nursing. (Check it out to see individual men nurses discussing their perspectives on joining the profession.)<\/p>\n Cottingham finds that many campaigns attempt to redefine nursing in traditionally manly terms \u2013 such as an occupation that involves risk-taking, courage, and adventure. This YouTube video, promoting travel nursing<\/a>, opens with men nurses engaging in extreme snowboarding and driving all-terrain vehicles as part of what travel nursing can look like.<\/p>\n
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