Gender and Professional Interests

GENDER AND PROFESSIONAL INTERESTS AS FACTORS IN SPORT RELATED KNOWLEDGE ACQUISITION

Zlatko Šafarić1, Ksenija Bosnar1, Davorin Babić2 and Irena Bagarić2 Catholic Faculty of Theology2, Faculty of Kinesiology University of Zagreb1,

Abstract Paper-and-pencil soccer, volleyball, handball and basketball-related knowledge test was given to four samples: 146 male and 68 female students of kinesiology, and 110 male and 30 female students from different other departments of University of Zagreb. Canonical discriminant analysis was applied and resulted in three significant discriminant functions. First function was defined by result in volleyball test and discriminate kinesiology at positive side, from non- kinesiology students at negative side. Second function was defined by handball and soccer knowledge and discriminate males at positive from females at negative side. Third function is defined by basketball and soccer scales and discriminate female non-kinesiology students from other groups. It shows that in this group the knowledge of basketball is relatively better comparing to relatively lower result on soccer scale, than knowledge of these two sports in other three groups is. The results show that relationship of gender, professional interests and knowledge about sport games is not the simple one.

Key words: undergraduate students, soccer, volleyball, handball, basketball

Introduction It is well established fact that men outnumber women in sport participation (Plaisted, 1995). Participation rates of males and females in our society show that men outnumber women by two to one. Less than 20% of female university students and less than 40% of male university students were ever engaged in some sport team of any level (Gošnik et al., 2002). The reason could be find in a number of social factors defining gender role and having impact on male and female behavior (Oglesby and Hill, 1993). Eccles and Harold (1991) found that elementary school girls by the end of the first grade develop lower expectations and perceived their ability to achieve success in sport and exercise less positively than boys. Martin et al. found that adolescent male athletes were more likely than female to believe that they could play at the college, Olympic games, or professional levels. The gender differences were found not only in participation but in attitudes and sport related knowledge (Busch et al., 2002). An exception was research by Babić et al. (2002), where no gender differences have been found neither in attitude nor in knowledge about soccer, but in a very specific sample consisting of students of theology. Knowledge about sport can be the factor influencing interests and sport related behavior. It

1 could be expected that students of kinesiology should know more about different sports than other students. At the same time, it could be expected that male students know more than female. The aim of this research is to find the differences in soccer, volleyball, handball and basketball-related knowledge test, in male and female students of kinesiology and university students of other subjects.

Methods The sample of this study consists of 146 male and 68 female students of kinesiology, and 110 male and 30 female students from different other departments of University of Zagreb, with total of 354 freshman students. The students were given the paper-and-pencil knowledge test having 40 questions about history, official rules, organisation, competitions and competitors, etc., of soccer, volleyball, handball and basketball. Each sport was represented by 10 questions forming four subscales of test. The total result in each scale was calculated as the sum of correct answers. Test results were analysed by canonical discriminant analysis where four groups were defined by gender and being kinesiology student or not.

Results and Discussion

Means and standard deviations of results on knowledge about soccer, handball, volleyball, and basketball scales in the group of male students of kinesiology, female students of kinesiology, male students of other faculties, female students of other faculties, and in total sample are in Table 1. It can be seen that kinesiology students have better results than others, with exception of male soccer result being better than female kinesiology student result. It can also be seen that male students have better results than female, with exception of the best result in volleyball scale in kinesiology female students, and female "other" students being better in basketball scale than their male colleagues are. Standard deviations notably vary. Leaving out volleyball, they are lower for kinesiological students indicating that same professional interest form more homogenous group. The product-moment correlations of results in scales of knowledge about four sport games obtained on total sample are in Table 2. They are all positive and statistically significant, explaining from 11 per cent of common variance of volleyball and soccer, to 22 per cent of common variance of soccer and basketball. All knowledge scales evidently belong to the same space. The values in correlation matrix suggest the existence of general factor of sport games knowledge.

2 Table 1. Means (M) and standard deviations (SD) of results on knowledge about soccer scale, knowledge about handball scale, knowledge about volleyball scale, and knowledge about basketball scale in the group of male students of Faculty of Kinesiology (MK), female students of Faculty of Kinesiology (FK), male students of other faculties (MO), female students of other faculties (FO), and on total sample (n=354).

group numbe soccer handball volleyball basketball r of subject M SD M SD M SD M SD s MK 146 8,644 0,820 7,884 1,377 7,178 1,353 7,705 1,249 FK 68 7,515 1,139 5,912 1,463 7,794 0,939 7,162 1,561 MO 110 8,018 1,465 5,500 1,464 4,791 1,314 6,309 1,537 FO 30 7,100 1,373 4,667 1,539 4,433 1,104 6,467 1,634 TOTAL 354 8,102 1,271 6,492 1,870 6,322 1,818 7,062 1,560

Table 2. The matrix (lower triangle) of product-moment correlations of results on knowledge about soccer scale, knowledge about handball scale (H), knowledge about volleyball scale (V), and knowledge about basketball scale (B)

soccer handball volleyball basketball soccer 1.000 handball 0.419 1.000 volleyball 0.334 0.476 1.000 basketball 0.473 0.442 0.488 1.000

Table 3. The results of dicriminant analysis: eigenvalues (E), canonical correlations (R), Wilks' Lambda (), -squared value, degrees of freedom (df), and level of significance (p)

Roots E R  df p removed   0 1,32115 0,75444 0,27223 454,084 12 0,00000

1 0,53074 0,58883 0,63189 160,204 6 0,00000

2 0,03384 0,18093 0,96726 11,616 2 0,00300

The results of canonical discriminant analysis are in Table 3. All three discriminant functions proved to be statistically significant. First function is dominantly defined by

3 knowledge about volleyball scale and than with modest value of knowledge about handball scale (Table 4). Second discriminant function is defined by handball and then soccer on the positive, and volleyball scale on the negative side of function. The third function has high value of basketball scale on positive and high value of soccer accompanied with moderate value of volleyball on negative side of discriminant function (Table 4). Group centroids on discriminant functions are in Table 5. First function discriminate kinesiology students having high results at positive side, from non-kinesiology students at negative side. The first discrimination is based on professional interests which are shown primarily in volleyball knowledge. Second function discriminate males at positive from females at negative side, showing that handball and soccer knowledge are more gender influenced than induced by professional interests. The Figure 1 shows the position of four groups on the first and second discriminant functions.

Table 4. Standardized coefficients for canonical variables (W) and discriminant factor structure (F) of variables knowledge about soccer, knowledge about handball, knowledge about volleyball, and knowledge about basketball.

variable W1 F1 W2 F2 W3 F3 soccer -0,296 0,154 0,594 0,561 -0,800 -0,457 handball 0,344 0,545 0,805 0,775 0,277 0,230 volleyball 0,923 0,921 -0,542 -0,114 -0,375 -0,244 basketball 0,021 0,341 -0,090 0,206 0,929 0,516

The results of canonical discriminant analysis are in Table 3. All three discriminant functions proved to be statistically significant. First function is dominantly defined by knowledge about volleyball scale and than with modest value of knowledge about handball scale (Table 4)..

Table 5. Group centroids on discriminant functions (D) for the group of male students of Faculty of Kinesiology (MK), female students of Faculty of Kinesiology (FK), male students of other faculties (MO), and female students of other faculties (FO).

group D1 D2 D3 MK 0,83707 0,64673 0,05524 FK 1,09813 -1,26874 -0,08484 MO -1,35755 0,11138 -0,16193 FO -1,58515 -0,67996 0,51724

4 Second discriminant function is defined by handball and then soccer scale result on the positive, and volleyball scale result on the negative side of function. The third function has high value of basketball scale on positive and high value of soccer accompanied with moderate value of volleyball on negative side of discriminant function.

Figure 1. Group centroids on the first and second discriminant functions (D) for the group of male students of Faculty of Kinesiology (MK), female students of Faculty of Kinesiology (FK), male students of other faculties (MO), and female students of other faculties (FO).

The third function discriminate female non-kinesiology students from other groups, showing that in this group the knowledge of basketball is relatively better and knowledge of soccer relatively inferior than it is in other groups. The results show that relationship of gender, professional interests and knowledge about sport games is not the simple one. All possible three discriminant functions were found significant and both, gender and professional choice were factors of discrimination. The third discrimination was found on the group the least interested in sport, female non-kinesiology students, showing that the members of the group know relatively more about basketball and relatively less about soccer than other three groups.

5 References 1. Babić, D., Bosnar, K., Bush, T., Prot, F. and Šafarić, Z. (2002). Gender differences of attitudes towards soccer in theology students. In: Milanović, D. and Prot, F. (Eds.): Kinesiology - new perspectives. Zagreb: Kineziološki fakultet Sveučilišta u Zagrebu, 731- 733 2. Busch, T., Bosnar, K., Prot, F., and Sertić, H. (2002). Attitudes towards soccer and soccer- related knowledge in elementary school population. In: Milanović, D. and Prot, F. (Eds.): Kinesiology - new perspectives. Zagreb: Kineziološki fakultet Sveučilišta u Zagrebu, 202- 204. 3. Eccles, J. S., & Harold, R. D. (1991). Gender differences in sport involvement: Applying the Eccles’ expectancy-value model. Journal of Applied Sport Psychology, 3, 7-35. 4. Gošnik, J., Bunjevac, T., Sedar, M., Prot, F. and Bosnar, K. (2002). Sport experience of undergraduate students. In: Milanović, D. and Prot, F. (Eds.): Kinesiology - new perspectives. Zagreb: Kineziološki fakultet Sveučilišta u Zagrebu, 457-461. 5. Martin, S. B., Richardson, P. A., Weiller, K. H., & Jackson, A. W. (2004). Role models, perceived sport encouragement, and sport expectations of adolescent athletes and their parents. Women in Sport & Physical Activity Journal, 13, 18-27. 6. Oglesby, C.A. and Hill, K.L. (1993). Gender and sport. In: Singer, R.N., Murphey, M. and Tennant, L.K. (Eds.). Handbook of Research on Sport Psychology. New York: Macmillan Publishing Company. 7. Plaisted, V. (1995). Gender and Sport. In: Morris, T. and Summers, J. (Eds.): Sport Psychology: Theory, Applications and Issues. Sidney: John Wiley & Sons Australia.