Wie Shock: Television Commentary About Playing on the PGA and LPGA Tours

摘要

Three identity-oriented attributes of golfer Michelle Wie stand out: (a) her gender as a women playing against men, (b) her ethnicityationality as an Asian American, and (c) her very young age (and thus presumed inexperience). Previous studies of televised sports have nearly uniformly found announcers to denigrate female athletes as compared to male athletes and undervalue the achievements of ethnic minorities. This study looked at biases in televised commentary related to Wie's gender, age, and ethnicity and asked whether she was treated like other female golfers or more like male golfers. Results showed that although depictions of Michelle Wie were anomalous to any other gender or ethnic group, she more frequently fit characterizations of female and non-American golfers. Increased comments about her lack of experience also emerged when assessing potential age biases.