Beyond the Silence: How Men Navigate Infertility Through Digital Communities and Data Sharing

TL;DR

Reddit's r/maleinfertility community functions as a hybrid space: informal diagnostic hub, therapeutic commons, and governed institution, and trauma-informed design for stigmatized health communities, highlighting role-aware systems and navigation support.

Abstract

Men experiencing infertility face unique challenges navigating Traditional Masculinity Ideologies that discourage emotional expression and help-seeking. This study examines how Reddit's r/maleinfertility community helps overcome these barriers through digital support networks. Using topic modeling (115 topics), network analysis (11 micro-communities), and time-lagged regression on 11,095 posts and 79,503 comments from 8,644 users, we found the community functions as a hybrid space: informal diagnostic hub, therapeutic commons, and governed institution. Medical advice dominates discourse (63.3\%), while emotional support (7.4\%) and moderation (29.2\%) create essential infrastructure. Sustained engagement correlates with actionable guidance and affiliation language, not emotional processing. Network analysis revealed structurally cohesive but topically diverse clusters without echo chamber characteristics. Cross-posters (20\% of users) who bridge r/maleinfertility and the gender-mixed r/infertility community serve as navigators and mentors, transferring knowledge between spaces. These findings inform trauma-informed design for stigmatized health communities, highlighting role-aware systems and navigation support.

Figures (7)

• Figure 1: Cluster membership growth over time. Most clusters show steady participation prior to 2020, followed by sharp increases during the COVID-19 lockdown period. This pattern suggests that broader social disruptions acted as catalysts for intensified engagement in male infertility discussions, contributing to the structural consolidation of clusters.
• Figure 2: Roles and interactions within male infertility support clusters. The diagram illustrates how newcomers, mentors, moderators, and experts overlap in functions such as way-finding, emotional counseling, policy enforcement, evidence sharing, and strategic medical guidance. These roles collectively shape community navigation, knowledge exchange, and emotional resilience.
• Figure 3: Feature importance for predicting cross-posting behavior. The plot shows both the relative contribution of each feature to the model’s output (SHAP value magnitude) and the direction of influence. Higher values of average reply sentiment, total user comments, and linguistic markers such as male and “we” pronouns increase the likelihood of cross-posting, while self-focused language (“I”), temporal references, and high response volume reduce it.
• Figure 4: Figure shows the spread of topic models along with associated topics and coherence scores. The top model with the highest coherence score is highlighted along with its parameters.
• Figure 5: Hierarchical treemap of Medical Advice discussions (63.34% of topics). Subthemes include advice on insurance, doctors, and medication expenses; adoption and family planning alternatives; interpretation of medical reports; fertility treatment protocols; and generalized health and wellbeing. This cluster shows how community members act as lay interpreters of biomedical knowledge while navigating systemic and financial barriers.