Athlete or Sex Symbol: What Boys Think of Media Representations of Female Athletes

Sex Roles (2011) 65:566579 DOI 10.1007/s11199-011-9959-7

ORIGINAL ARTICLE

Athlete or Sex Symbol: What Boys Thinkof Media Representations of Female Athletes

Elizabeth A. Daniels & Heidi Wartena

Published online: 10 March 2011# Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2011

Abstract Little research has investigated males reactions to non-objectified media images of women, including those that depict women in instrumental activities like playing a sport. Using a survey methodology, this study examined U.S. adolescent boys open-ended responses to images of performance athletes, sexualized athletes, and sexualized models. Participants were 104 adolescent boys from California (ages 1217, primarily European-American). They remarked on the performance athletes physical competence and focused on the athletic context depicted in the photograph. In contrast, participants focused on the physical appearance and attractiveness of the sexualized athletes and sexualized models. Overall, findings suggest that performance images of women evoke instrumental evaluations of women from male viewers, while sexualized images induce objectified appraisals.

Keywords Males . Media images . Objectification . Body image . Sports . Female athletes

Introduction

Past research has shown that the mass media in Western contexts generally portray stereotypical and sexualized representations of women and femininity that transmit the notion that women are sexual objects to be viewed and evaluated by men (Ward and Harrison 2005). A large body of research with primarily Western samples has examined

how these images affect girls and women (e.g., Field et al. 1999; Grabe et al. 2008; Groesz et al. 2002; Levine et al. 1994; Ward and Harrison 2005), yet only a small body of research has examined how they affect males (e.g., Aubrey and Taylor 2009; Hargreaves and Tiggemann 2002, 2003). Further, little research has investigated what male viewers think of performance-focused images of women, such as an athlete in action, rather than idealized and sexualized images of women (exceptions with U.S. samples include Heywood and Dworkin 2003; Knight and Giuliano 2001). Media images of female athletes playing their sport (performance-focused) provide the potential for depicting women in instrumental ways. These images may prompt male viewers to focus on womens physical abilities rather than their physical appearance. However, female athletes are also sexualized in media, which may elicit similar responses in male viewers as other objectified portrayals of women (e.g., Messner et al. 2003). In...