Date of Award:

5-2014

Document Type:

Thesis

Degree Name:

Master of Science (MS)

Department:

Kinesiology and Health Science

Department name when degree awarded

Health, Physical Education, and Recreation

Committee Chair(s)

Julie Gast

Committee

Julie Gast

Committee

Phillip Waite

Committee

Reed Geertsen

Abstract

Previous research has noted that married men tend to be healthier than single men. And that wives may exert influence on men’s health behaviors, both positively and negatively, through social control methods. However, little research has examined how men maintain masculine status when faced with spousal social control efforts. The purpose of this study was twofold. First, the study sought to gain a greater understanding of how wives exert social control over spousal health behaviors. Second, the study sought to examine how men maintain masculinity, specifically masculine capital, when their wives desire to change the health behaviors of their husband’s.

Umbersons’s 1987 model of social control was modified to analyze the focus group data; i.e. masculinity and masculine capital were added to the original constructs of family relationships, social control, health behaviors, and physical health/mortality. The construct of spousal social control replaced Umberson’s social control construct. To test this model, a total of five focus groups were conducted with 44 currently married men in Cache Valley, Utah. The benefits of the study explain why spousal social control, masculinity, and masculine capital should each be carefully considered and researched when conducting needs assessments and when planning interventions or health education programs designed to improve men’s health behaviors. Findings also indicate that wives’ play a significant role in their husbands’ health behaviors.

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