Go “Heavy” or Go Home: An Examination of Audience Attitudes and Their Relationship to Gender Cues in the 2010 Olympic Snowboarding Coverage

Abstract

This study uses a multimethod approach to examine links between societal attitudes about one extreme sport, snowboarding, and gender cues present in 2010 Winter Olympics broadcasts. Results of a nationwide survey of 718 adults found that viewing time emerged as the main predictor variable for attitudes. Respondents who watched more men's coverage rated the sport as more masculine, and those who watched more women's coverage rated the sport as more feminine. Attitudes toward the athletes were more complex, with heavy viewers rating both male and female boarders as possessing more of the masculine and feminine qualities success in the sport demands. Next, a content analysis was employed to examine visual and verbal cues present in 2 hours and 25 minutes of NBC's primetime coverage. Running time was equal for both sexes. Also, some cues present in the broadcasts did support traditional gender stereotypes, but other gendered cues were emphasized equally and amply for both sexes. The results provide evidence that gender cues in media coverage of the burgeoning area of extreme Olympic sports and audience attitudes may feed off each other.