Using Social Media Networks to Engage Men in Conversations on Masculinity and Suicide: Content Analysis of Man Up Facebook Campaign Data

Abstract

We analyzed comments published on the Man Up Facebook page ( manuptvseries) during the roll-out of the Man Up digital campaign. The aim was to gain insight into how the public perceived the Man Up campaign and the conversation topics that the campaign instigated. We downloaded Facebook threads (posts and comments) from the manuptvseries page using NCapture and performed conventional content analysis on a random set of comments ( n = 2,236) to identify how the campaign was perceived and what were the popular conversations. Overall, the campaign was perceived extremely positively by the Facebook audience showing many comments endorsing the content of the campaign by sharing among their Facebook community. The strongest themes were expressing emotions, help and support, and masculinity/gender roles which related to the higher level theme of expressions of masculinity. Another strong theme was suicide and topics related to suicide. Comments acknowledged the importance of discussing the issues of male suicide and masculinity publicly. Men were less engaged with topics on masculinity and expressing emotions compared with women and recognized stigma around help-seeking for mental health issues. The Man Up Facebook campaign did foster a public discussion on masculinity and suicide. A gendered approach in mental health promotion is needed with stigma still present for men when seeking help for mental health problems. Social media holds considerable potential for the use of health promotion campaigns aiming to increase interpersonal communication on challenging health topics. Yet, these campaigns need to carefully manage the risk of reinforcing stereotypes.