An Exploration of Gender-Role Expectations and Conflict among Women Rugby Players

Abstract

Gender-role conflict theory has suggested that women athletes will experience role conflict because they are attempting to enact both feminine and masculine gender roles, yet research findings have shown mixed support for this notion. The purpose of this study was to explore how women rugby players negotiate gender-role expectations and conflict as women participating in a traditionally masculine sport. Eleven Caucasian women, noncollege rugby players between the ages of 25 and 38 were interviewed. The results indicated that women rugby players perceived numerous discrepant gender-role expectations. In addition, three different types of gender-role conflict emerged; however, similar to previous findings, participants perceived conflicting expectations for their gender-role behavior more than they seemed to experience conflict about those expectations. Participants actively employed various strategies to resolve or avoid experiencing gender-role conflict. The resiliency displayed by the women athletes in coping with discrepant gender-role messages provides new considerations for gender-role conflict theory.