Olympic Countdown - Handball

The subject of discrimination against women in sport is a topical one, with a recent documentary by Gabby Logan for the BBC, and the controversy about the refusal of Augusta National to allow women members. If you’re refereeing a sporting event, a foul is a foul, and in theory it shouldn’t matter whether it’s made by a male or female athlete. However, it’s difficult to escape from seeing others as stereotypes. Research has shown that people explicitly expect and prefer that women show traits such as kindness and gentleness, and that men show confidence and aggressiveness (Eagly 2007; Deaux & Lafrance 1998). So it’s common for individuals of either gender to be more shocked by aggressive behaviour from women than from men (Deaux & Lafrance 1998; Knight, Guthrie, Page & Fabes, 2002). Indeed, female interactions are perceived as more than male interactions, even when both situations are similar (Condry & Ross, 1995). With regard to handball, Souchon et al (2004) found that male referees more frequently gave the ball back to the victim of aggressive behaviours in females than in male games, and that referees gave disciplinary punishments more frequently when fouls were made by women than by men. So it seems that referees do apply the rules of the sport differently according the gender of the players. There’s evidence that this bias can persist even at high levels of the sport. Kolnes (1995) found that some women playing for the top international Norwegian handball team thought that they are refereed very severely and unfairly when they behave too aggressively or are perceived as acting in a masculine manner. According to these women, severe punishments could be avoided by adopting a seductive and feminine (non-argumentative) attitude towards the referees, who are usually men. It’s possible that referees play advantage more often than men, if men are more skilful at being able to continue their play despite being fouled. However, this effect would be less likely to occur at the highest levels when women are more skilled. To investigate this further, Souchon et al (2009) filmed 30 matches (15 men’s and 15 women’s) from the First Division of the French Handball Championships. All the referees were men. In handball, there are two types of award that the referee can give when there’s a foul: award a 9-metre throw (give the ball back to the victim where the foul occurred); or award a 7-metre throw (a direct shot on goal like a football penalty). There are also three possible disciplinary sanctions: a yellow card warning; a 2-minute suspension from the game; or a red card, meaning permanent exclusion from the game. For the 9-metre throws, referees were more likely to punish female players than male players, but there was no difference for the 7-metre throws. So referees were more likely to mete out mild punishment (as opposed to no punishment) to female players, while giving severe punishments to the same extent to both sexes. There was no difference between the sexes when it came to disciplinary decisions. The lack of difference for severe offences and discipline may be because these decisions are much rarer in games. For instance, there were relatively few yellow cards or 2-minute suspensions, and no red cards in any of the 30 matches. Players averaged more than 150 transgressions in each match. Souchon gives “benign” and “hostile” sexism as possible explanations for the referees’ behaviour. They might hold the (subconscious) view that women have less sporting ability than men, so may be less able to withstand being fouled, so would be less likely to play advantage. They may also believe that a woman who falls during a game is not play-acting, whereas a man is more likely to “dive” (benign sexism). On the other hand, if they have a perception that women should not be aggressive, any aggressive behaviour they do show will be magnified, and more likely to be punished (hostile sexism). I've umpired a few ladies’ cricket games, and always enjoyed them. I’ve never had any disciplinary issues, but if they were to occur I’ll try and treat them the same as I would do in a men’s match. I still think I might be a bit shocked, though. David Donner