You’ve Got (Too Much) Male: An Analysis of Gender Depictions of ESPN’s Talk and Debate Shows (2011)

Undergraduate: Anna Winker

Faculty Advisor: Charles Tuggle
Department: Journalism & Mass Communication

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The purpose of this study was to look at how women are depicted on sports talk and debate shows. The stories discussed and female co-hosts and guests were looked at, as well as the interactions between these women and their male counterparts. It was hypothesized that there would be few to no stories about female athletes and that the female hosts would be relegated to minor stories, while the male hosts were given the major topics.
To analyze these interactions, three different shows were studied. Two weeks worth of First Take, SportsNation, and Pardon the Interruption were recorded on a DVR device. Coding sheets were made for categories like sex of subject, sex of guest, and the length of time spoken by each person. In addition to this quantitative analysis, any noticeable remarks or interaction about gender or between the hosts were recorded.

The results both confirmed and disputed the hypotheses. There were only four stories about female athletes and three female guests on the shows, but the female hosts were treated fairly equally on the show. On First Take the hosts were separated for almost the entire show, but they alternated introducing each story and who participated in the debate section of the show. On SportsNation the hosts interacted constantly and talked fairly evenly about each topic. Pardon the Interruption has only male hosts and served primarily as a control. There were very few discriminatory comments on any of the shows.