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BEYOND THE CRISIS OF MASCULINITY: A TRANSTHEORETICAL MODEL FOR MALE-FRIENDLY THERAPY BY GARY R. BROOKS .WASHINGTON, DC: AMERICAN PSYCHOLOGICAL ASSOCIATION, 2009, 221 PP.
In his text, Beyond the Crisis of Masculinity: A Transtheoretical Model for MaleFriendly Therapy, Gary R. Brooks builds on his important work focusing on the disconnect between males and mental health services. In this book, Brooks first lays out his definition of the crisis of masculinity, defining it as "the distress of men struggling to cope with both the inherent contradictions of the traditional male role and the sweeping changes in the demands of contemporary manhood." (p. 7). He then explores how he sees psychotherapy having failed boys and men as they address this crisis before he provides more "male friendly" approaches to psychotherapy that could make mental health services more attractive and helpful to males.
Throughout the early chapters of his book, Brooks makes it clear how many men end up feeling that they are damned if they do engage in mental health services (because if they were "real men" they wouldn't need such services) and damned if they don't take advantage of such services (because then they are seen as unfeeling, unempathetic and incapable of engaging in meaningful relationships).
The central project of the book is to apply the transtheoretical model of therapy (as explored in the work of Prochaska and others) to the challenging work of engaging males in the therapeutic process. Brooks explores how each of the five stages of change in the transtheoretical model - precontemplation, contemplation, preparation, action and maintenance- can be approached in a male friendly way. Brooks highlights how male precontemplators, for example, can be helped past the shame of coming into therapy if they can be helped to see their personal problems through the impersonal lens of Pleck's "gender role strain paradigm" (p. 153). Brooks states: "...this model proposes that a considerable portion of men's problems...