Alternative Approaches for Health, Mental Wellbeing andSuicide Prevention for Boys and Young Men

There is considerable current policy debate and public discourse about the nature of health, wellbeing and sui-cide in boys and young men. Unfortunately, little of the discussion seems to be founded on established modelsof best practice for working with young males in this space. Further, arguments proffered, and decisions maderegularly tend to omit the voice of young males from the process. For optimal health outcomes and suicideprevention to be achieved for young males and subsequently across their whole lifespan, substantial evidenceneeds to be gathered and considered in establishing benchmarks for policy, funding, and service delivery. Thearticle will explore some of the established literature that covers this area, as well as emerging research that isadding to current knowledge as the article looks at the emerging non-medial alternative approaches such asmentoring as an early intervention, the impact of social determinants of health and collaborative group-basedactivities and also a change in media content from highlighting hegemonic/toxic masculinity to more positiveemotional stories of men showing a resilient attitude to life’s problems. The article discuses a growing need tomove away from medical approaches especially in the case of attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder that is 3-9times more prevalent amongst young boys who are diagnosed with it than girls. There is a need to find a morebalanced physical/medical health and mental/emotional wellbeing approach for young men to deal with thetransition from boyhood to manhood.