Many boys lack ‘emotional literacy’

By fifth grade, boys know that there are certain rules on the playground. They know that they’re not supposed to cry, especially in front of boys, or show they are scared.

“If a boy doesn’t do something he normally would do – he’s scared to play tackle football – some people would yell at him, ‘Sissy’ or ‘Baby’ or ‘Wimp’, ” says 11-year-old Thomas (not his real name). “Wimp is used more on boys.”

Thomas says he burst into tears recently because some other kids were teasing him and he got into an argument with one of his friends.

“I totally burst out crying after lunch, but normally boys try to keep that in or hold it until they’re alone. Unless they get really hurt they normally wouldn’t do that,” Thomas explains.

Boys worry that other boys will “think of you as being a sissy or being girly or something – not being too manly. I don’t think it’s bad but other people think it’s bad.”

Even in this new millennium, boys struggle with the unwritten, unspoken rule that it’s not acceptable for them to express sadness and other emotions, says psychologist Dr. Dan Kindlon, co-author with Dr. Michael Thompson of 1999’s best seller, “Raising Cain: Protecting the Emotional Life of Boys” (Ballantine Books).

“Emotions become this foreign territory for boys,” Kindlon said in a recent lecture for an audience of mental-health professionals in Doylestown, Pa.

Feminists helped broaden the definition of what it is to be feminine in the 1960s and ‘70s, Kindlon says. As a result, everyone accepts that girls should be able to play sports and do math and that they can have careers and be wives and mothers, Kindlon says. That has given girls the flexibility to know they can be leaders and still be emotional and nurturing.

But the definition of masculinity has not evolved as much, and “it’s too narrow,” Kindlon says. Boys don’t learn that they can be strong and nurturing and they still view displays of emotions as weak. As a result, they are less flexible.

“We’ve got to expand that if we want our boys to be more mentally healthy,” Kindlon says.

Many boys today are in trouble, Kindlon says. They are far more likely than girls to have behavior problems, get involved with drugs and alcohol and commit crimes.

They are nearly twice as likely to fight, steal, commit vandalism or get into trouble at school. Boys commit 90 percent of homicides, 80 percent of aggravated assaults, 98 percent of rapes and 90 percent of robberies. They are four times as likely to commit suicide as teenagers than girls and twice as likely to die in a car accident. About 86 percent of homicide victims are male.

Parents are the first culprits in teaching boys – sometimes in subtle ways – that expressing a wide range of emotions isn’t acceptable, Kindlon explains. They are the first to teach boys that it’s OK to express anger but not fear or sadness.

Studies show that both parents, but especially fathers, tend to steer boys away from discussions about their inner life. Parents spend more time talking about feelings with their daughters.

Studies show parents use harsher punishment – including physical punishment or abuse – with their sons than their daughters. This is partly because boys tend to misbehave in ways that make their parents very angry, Kindlon says. But harsh punishment “tends to increase bad behavior,” and such punishment makes boys more aggressive.

Video games and television also teach boys a lot about how to be strong and aggressive but very little about talking about their emotions.

Boys also have a difficult time in school, especially in early elementary grades, because classrooms, which are mostly taught by female teachers, are not set up for boys. Kindlon believes the reasons for these problems have more to do with our culture than with inherent, biological sex differences. Males in the United States are more likely to be aggressive than boys in other cultures. They do not have the tools to cope with strong, negative emotions, he says.

The key to solving boys’ deeper problems is to teach them “emotional literacy” so they can cope with strong, negative emotions, Kindlon says. Parents, particularly fathers, can do this by talking about their own emotions and exploring other people’s feelings, even those of characters in books.

Fathers are particularly important in boys’ lives because they serve as role models, Kindlon says. They are the ones who can teach boys that they can be tough and still talk about their feelings. Fathers also need to be more involved in their children’s lives and to spend time with their children.

They can show their sons that they can have close friendships with other men to encourage them to have close friendships themselves, Kindlon writes. They can also show that there are many ways to be a man, he says. The fact that more fathers are staying home with their children and taking a greater role in raising their children helps teach boys how important a job fathering is.

In the end, those emotional skills are the best gift you can give your little boy who, soon enough, will become a man.