Pretty Versus Powerful in the Sports Pages

Abstract

To examine how descriptions of the performance of female athletes are likely to reflect dominant beliefs about gender in society, 769 passages from the print media describing gold medal winning contests for four U.S. women’s teams in the 1996 Olympics (basketball, gymnastics, soccer, and softball) and the U.S. women’s hockey team in the 1998 Olympics were subjected to content analysis. The sports analyzed fall under the categories of Matteo’s study classifying the gender appropriateness of sport (masculine, feminine, and neutral). Two dimensions were examined for each passage: task relevance and use of gender stereotypes. Consistent with our expectations, female athletes in male sports were described by the print media using frequent male-to-female comparisons and comments that had little to do with sports or the athlete’s performance. Print media coverage of female athletes in female sports focused on performance while reinforcing female stereotypes. Implications of the images of female athletes portrayed by the print media are discussed.