Inside the manosphere: A world-first look at what young men actually see on TikTok
Movember researchers have analysed the TikTok viewing histories of 142 young men to go inside the digital worlds shaping masculinity today. Here’s what they found, and why it matters.
What is the TikTok algorithm actually showing young men?
Everybody is talking about the Manosphere – but we’re often talking about it as if it’s one thing: one ideology, one type of influencer, populated by one type of young man. Movember researchers wanted to test that assumption. To better understand what masculinity content young men are actually seeing online, the research team recruited 142 young men aged 16–25 across Australia, the UK and the US, and asked them to share their real TikTok data. The team then watched and coded more than 2,000 videos that appeared in their For You pages.
From that work, they developed the Masculinity Content Classification Framework (MCCF) – the first tool to categorise and measure masculinity content on a mainstream social media platform.
What they found
The research identified three broad tiers of content appearing in young men’s feeds.
- The first tier is what the researchers call cultural touchpoints: sport, fitness, music, fashion, gaming, men’s lifestyle. Everyday stuff that makes up the majority of what young men see online.
- The second tier is masculine status content – videos that promote stereotypical ideas about masculinity, linking wealth, dominance, physical strength and emotional toughness to what it means to be a ‘real’ or ‘successful’ man. These narratives often emphasise masculine status, self-reliance and emotional invulnerability.
- The third tier – degrading health content – includes material depicting health risk-taking behaviours, hate speech, explicit misogyny and violence towards oneself or others.
When researchers applied the framework to participants’ videos, they found the majority of masculinity-related content young men watched fell within the cultural touchpoints tier (37.7%) – mainstream lifestyle and popular culture content such as sport, fitness and gaming.
A smaller proportion reflected more rigid masculine ideals, health risk-taking behaviours and harmful attitudes towards others (4.89% - masculine status), while 0.87% depicted explicit harm towards oneself or others, including misogynistic or hate-based content (degrading health).
While proportionally smaller, researchers note degrading health content does not exist in isolation. Instead, it can sit alongside more ordinary lifestyle and popular culture material within the same digital ecosystems, blurring the boundaries between everyday masculinity content and more rigid or harmful narratives.
The part that surprises most people
Messages, content and influencers once confined to fringe or radicalised online communities are now showing up in young men’s social media feeds. Young men don’t necessarily seek out this content, the algorithm takes them to it.
What’s striking is how these manosphere ideologies show up and spread – embedded within the culturally relevant topics and trends young men care about, such as gaming, fashion, sports and music. Movember researchers describe this as an “inverted iceberg”– highly visible lifestyle content at the surface, with intensifying layers of dominance, exclusionary attitudes and harmful health behaviours underneath, connected within the same ecosystem and amplified through algorithmic recommendation.
The same topics appear across all three tiers – but they carry very different meanings and messages.
“Cultural entry points matter. The same topics, such as sports, dating, fashion and finance carry different meanings depending on the messages about masculinity and health within it. Sport or fitness content present as entertainment or self-improvement in one moment, but in another endorse dominance, control over others or restrictive ideas about what men’s bodies should look like.”
— Dr Krista Fisher, Lead Researcher, Movember Institute of Men’s Health
Seeing masculinity content as a spectrum – rather than a binary phenomenon – is essential. Otherwise we misrepresent most young men’s digital experiences and misattribute risk for young men and for those around them.
“What’s important here is that this content doesn’t sit in isolation – it exists alongside and is often embedded within everyday material that young men are already engaging with. That helps explain why it can resonate, particularly when it taps into real questions around identity, success and belonging.”
— Dr Krista Fisher, Lead Researcher, Movember Institute of Men’s Health
Young men aren’t looking for harm
Many young men engaging with this content are not actively seeking harmful material.
In algorithmically driven environments, young men can be exposed to a mix of content they may not intentionally search for. Our earlier research demonstrated that 57% of young men say they don’t even understand how social media platforms decide what to show them.
“Many young men engaging with this content are not looking for harm – they’re looking for direction, belonging and answers at a time when they’re trying to make sense of who they are. But in algorithm-driven environments, they don’t just choose what they see – content is surfaced to them, and repeated exposure can start to make certain ideas feel normal, even when they’re not.”
— Dr Zac Seidler, Global Director of Research, Movember Institute of Men’s Health
Josh Sargent, a 16-year-old UK-based writer and youth advocate who has spoken publicly about his own experience navigating masculinity content online, knows this first-hand.
“When I was around 12 to 14, I was drawn in myself, and within a few swipes the content suggested by the algorithm could descend from fairly harmless fitness or self-improvement content to much more rigid ideas about what it meant to be a man, and the standards that had to be met in order to be valued by society.”
— Josh Sargent, 16, UK writer and youth advocate
The impact is real — for young men and the people around them
We know from Movember’s wider research that young men who regularly engage with masculinity influencers report higher levels of psychological distress. 27% say that content can leave them feeling worthless, compared with young men who don’t engage with it.
“The risk is that some of the loudest voices offering those answers promote rigid or harmful ideas about masculinity, which can affect not just young men themselves, but their relationships and the people around them.”
— Dr Zac Seidler, Global Director of Research, Movember Institute of Men’s Health
This isn’t only a men’s health issue. Researchers say repeated exposure to rigid or degrading ideas about masculinity can shape attitudes, relationships and social environments beyond the screen.
What this means for the people who care about them
If there’s a young man in your life – a son, a brother, a student, a mate – you don’t need to panic.Stay curious. Ask what he’s watching. Talk about the stuff you see online, without making him feel judged or interrogated.
“What young men need isn’t to be told they’re the problem – it’s better conversations, better role models and spaces where we can talk honestly about what we’re going through.”
— Josh Sargent, 16, UK writer and youth advocate
What Movember is doing next
The Framework isn’t just a research output – it’s a practical tool. For the first time, researchers, policymakers, educators and platforms have a shared language to identify, track and respond to harmful masculinity content at scale. You can’t fix what you can’t measure. Now we can measure it.
Movember is investing in what comes next through the Young Men & Media Collective – co-convened with Equimundo – bringing together content creators, platforms and researchers to build healthier alternatives to the content currently filling young men’s feeds. This month nine global finalists will be announced to take part in a ‘test and learn’ programme, producing and distributing content that speaks directly to young men, offering more diverse and realistic ideas about what it means to be a man.
An open invitation
We believe platforms, creators and policymakers have a genuine role to play in this. Digital platforms and recommendation systems play a significant role in shaping what young men encounter online.
This research wasn’t built to point fingers. It was built to provide the evidence base that makes better decisions possible.
If you work in policy, research, education or digital media and want to know more about the Masculinity Content Classification Framework – or explore how it could be applied in your context – we’d love to hear from you.
Building healthier digital environments for young men is a shared responsibility.
→ Read the full research publication