Female athletes get shafted by Olympic sports commentators, says James Angelini, assistant professor of communication at the University of Delaware. He watched all 64 hours of NBC’s prime time coverage of the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, coded every adjective and adverb broadcasters used to describe the athletes, and then published his results in the Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media. Happy 40th Birthday, Title IX His findings: Men received 62% of primetime coverage, while women received only 38%. Of the 20 most-mentioned athletes, 75% were men—and they received 336% more mentions than female athletes on the list. Those are pretty shocking numbers, considering that the majority of viewers are women. But it’s not merely a case of women not being mentioned enough: It’s also how they’re discussed. While it’s all about ability with the males, “it’s all about luck with the females,” Angelini says. When females took home a medal, Angelini found that commentators attributed the win more to luck and less to physical ability. When women lost, the descriptors reversed: That’s when the athletes’ physical ability andcommitment levels were mentioned. But when males won medals, their skill and commitment were primarily praised. When they failed, commentators redirected the conversation to how their competitors succeeded. Women’s looks also play a part. “Women tend to get the most airtime in the sports where beauty is a component of the competition,” Angelini says, citing sports such as gymnastics and figure skating. Even in events in which appearance is irrelevant, female athlete’s bodies were the subject of more comments than men’s. Instant Inspiration From Top Female Athletes The games have come a long way since their men-only days, but biases persist, says Angelini. For proof of Olympic-sized sexism, look no further than any Sports Illustrated cover graced by an athlete. Guess which gender is shot nearly naked, even if their sport is played in the snow? So what gives? “Sports is still thought of in our society as a masculine domain,” he says. And women, he says, are viewed as “outsiders invading masculine space.” Despite the fact that half of all college athletes are female, Angelini says. Bottom line: While female athletes continue to sprint (successfully) for the finish line, it’s pitifully clear that some people are pacing slowly behind them.
