Teen Boys Need Support in Increasingly Digital World

Adolescent males face numerous challenges growing up in today’s culture, particularly related to social media, video games, and other technologies that can affect physical and mental health. Further, violent crimes among young men are chronic and increasing. More can, and should, be done to support boys as they navigate an increasingly digital world, especially as extremist groups target teen boys and young men online, explained presenters during an Annual Meeting session.

“Boys and girls are different, and we need to talk frankly about their different social and treatment needs,” said the session chair Kristopher Kaliebe, M.D., an associate professor of psychiatry at the University of South Florida. “It seems that, somehow, boys and young men have gotten lost in the mix. They’re not getting enough support, encouragement, and [limitations set for them] as well. If they don’t have these things, they won’t do well, society won’t do well, and we’ll continue to fail them.”

He pointed out that adolescent boys are less likely than girls to be encouraged to improve themselves, such as through academics or by learning life skills. Social media, especially, can exacerbate this. “My concern is that online culture is not emphasizing scholarship and academics, but instead it celebrates the opposite,” he said.

In general, the favorite screen-time activity among teen boys and young men is video games, said Paul Weigle, M.D., associate medical director of Natchaug Hospital Ambulatory Services at Hartford HealthCare. Most boys play video games an average of three hours a day, Weigle said.

“Gaming is a ubiquitous habit,” Weigle said. “It’s not a question of whether teens and young men are playing, but how much they’re playing.” Most play in a controlled and reasonably moderate pattern and do not experience any significant negative effects, he said. But there are adolescent males who play excessively, playing between four and 10 hours a day. “These are the young men who find gaming the most enjoyable and engaging, and these are also the ones who are going to have a hard time disengaging, even when their gaming negatively impacts their daily lives,” he said.

The more time young men spend playing video games over two hours per day, the worse their health is, largely due to the displacement of healthy behaviors and routines, Weigle said. “If someone is playing between six and 10 hours a day, other important life activities and habits go by the wayside,” such as socializing, exercising, academic activities, and healthy diets, Weigle said. Frequent gamers also struggle to sleep, as it takes two and a half times longer to fall asleep after gaming than watching TV or reading a book.

“It’s important to remember when treating this age group that video games can have a very strong impact on mental health, particularly for those who engage in an excessive, problematic way,” Weigle said. “Excessive gaming puts one at risk for develop a new onset, or worsening, depression and social anxiety, and it can lead to failure in school and deterioration of family relationships.”

Video games have also increasingly become the mode through which extremist groups recruit adolescent males, explained Elizabeth Englander, Ph.D., executive director of the Massachusetts Aggression Reduction Center.

Research has shown a combination of characteristics that make adolescent males particularly vulnerable to recruitment by extremist groups online, including loneliness, social isolation, and unconventionality. Boys may be more at risk for recruitment because they tend to be more socially isolated than girls, they are more likely to play video games (particularly first-person shooter games), and because extremist groups are designed to appeal directly to boys, she said. An alt-right group like the Proud Boys, for example, promises boys that they will no longer feel isolated while also giving them an opportunity to demonstrate their masculinity.

“One of the difficulties in our culture is that boys can very easily feel as though they have failed if they are not masculine enough,” Englander said. “There is a very rigid set of characteristics boys must achieve if they are going to meet standards of masculinity and feel good about themselves.”

Englander outlined methods adults can use to prevent extremist group recruitment, including to be very clear about values and what is considered right and wrong. “One of the ways these groups recruit children is by starting in a morally gray area and expressing themselves in ways that are not obviously offensive and only slightly wrong,” Englander said. “We need to be really clear and say, for example, that violence is always wrong, it is never okay to hurt people, and there are no exceptions to the rule.” ■