The Federal Government is being called to urgently overhaul support services for children and teenagers experiencing violence, as new research reveals harmful pressures on boys are driving worrying trends.
The Adolescent Man Box report, released by Jesuit Social Services’ The Men’s Project, shows many boys continue to feel pressure to conform to rigid and harmful ideas about masculinity. These pressures are linked to higher rates of violence, controlling behaviour, and poor mental health, with direct impacts on girls, women and gender-diverse communities.
The report is based on an Australian-first survey of 1,400 adolescents of all genders aged 14 to 18.
The research found strong social pressure on boys to appear tough, unemotional and in control. Boys who most strongly conformed to these “Man Box” rules were significantly more likely to justify violence, engage in controlling behaviour and consume sexually violent pornography.
It was found in the boys who most strongly support the Adolescent Man Box rules that more than one quarter believe that if a man is violent to his partner, it is probably because they deserve it or did something to provoke it.
It also found that more than 80 per cent of boys who have watched pornography have seen any harmful act happening to a female, and a similar number have seen something happening to someone without consent
And more than a quarter say their friends would use AI to create fake nude images of people they know.
The report calls for a coordinated, well-funded system to support children and adolescents who have experienced violence or abuse.
This insight aligns with the Domestic Family and Sexual Violence Commission’s Yearly Report, which emphasises that children and young people are not only indirect bystanders, but are direct victims of domestic, family and sexual violence, and that our current service systems are failing to respond adequately.
Sally Stevenson, Executive Director of the Illawarra Women’s Trauma Recovery Centre, said together, these pieces of evidence underscore the urgent need for tailored, age-appropriate support for children and adolescents.
“We need services that understand how masculinity, peer pressure and trauma shape young people’s lives, and that step in early with consistent, age-appropriate support, before harm becomes entrenched,” she said.
“We are seeing more young people impacted by coercive control, sexual assault, image-based abuse and family violence, yet the services that should be supporting them simply don’t exist at scale.”
The Man Box report recommends the Federal Government design and fully fund a comprehensive network of services for children and young people affected by violence, with states and territories matching funds.